Allied Mills screwing farmers over with dodgy claims?

[White rabbit]

Good reply and one of the many reasons why I have explained to @White rabbit That I consider the cereals and Oilseeds levy good value for money. There is an absolute wealth of information from HGCA/AHDB research if you care to look for it.

This good value you talk of an gof ,how many acres of cereals would you need to pay £30,000 levy ,you only pay 47p a ton depending on yield you would need at least 15 to 17ooo acres to pay the same .

 

[fudge]

I disagree entirely with mandatory or statutory levies. If the research or whatever offered by these quangos is so good then it can surely stand on it's own as a commercial service with each producer to decide whether they wish to pay the fee or not. How the heck in this day and age government have allowed such an out of date anti-competitive practice to remain I have no idea.

The AHDB is not an anti competitive body. I presume you would prefer to see the research carried out by those kings of the perfect market, the agricultural supply industry, with their “real science” and oh so selective trials? I can only speak of combinable crops, but the basis of these systems is variety selection, every grower benefits from the necessary stream of plant breeding so surely every grower should make a contribution to the system that evaluates them? If the government legislated against this system they would be tilting the playing field even more in favour of the near monopolies who service this industry. Maybe the judgement is that isn’t in the national interest?

 

[ollie989898]

The AHDB is not an anti competitive body. I presume you would prefer to see the research carried out by those kings of the perfect market, the agricultural supply industry, with their “real science” and oh so selective trials? I can only speak of combinable crops, but the basis of these systems is variety selection, every grower benefits from the necessary stream of plant breeding so surely every grower should make a contribution to the system that evaluates them? If the government legislated against this system they would be tilting the playing field even more in favour of the near monopolies who service this industry. Maybe the judgement is that isn’t in the national interest?

I don't care for the merits or otherwise of any organisation that is funded by mandatory levies. It's not right. A business should make it's own decisions on what it chooses to invest it's own profits in, not be forced to by the state 'for it's own good'. Either pay for it with taxation or have a commercial model where a producer may choose to pay an annual subscription and not a ridiculous levy applied per tonne/litre or beast.

A business with a virtually guaranteed income it's customers are forced to pay, errr, if that isn't anti-competitive I don't know what is.

 

[ajd132]

The AHDB is not an anti competitive body. I presume you would prefer to see the research carried out by those kings of the perfect market, the agricultural supply industry, with their “real science” and oh so selective trials? I can only speak of combinable crops, but the basis of these systems is variety selection, every grower benefits from the necessary stream of plant breeding so surely every grower should make a contribution to the system that evaluates them? If the government legislated against this system they would be tilting the playing field even more in favour of the near monopolies who service this industry. Maybe the judgement is that isn’t in the national interest?

I pay niab and green crop information for independant work, always a few years ahead of ahdb. Take everything from agrii etc with a pinch of salt. Why do they still have blackgrass at stow longa if their system is so good !

 

[fudge]

I don't care for the merits or otherwise of any organisation that is funded by mandatory levies. It's not right. A business should make it's own decisions on what it chooses to invest it's own profits in, not be forced to by the state 'for it's own good'. Either pay for it with taxation or have a commercial model where a producer may choose to pay an annual subscription and not a ridiculous levy applied per tonne/litre or beast.

A business with a virtually guaranteed income it's customers are forced to pay, errr, if that isn't anti-competitive I don't know what is.

Do you pay any levy?

 

[ollie989898]

Do you pay any levy?

No and I would be pished if I ever had to.

 

[Hooby Farmer]

Years ago when I was just leaving secondary school I remember a merchant (the same one my oul boy has used for 40 years) buying all our grain from us and over the course of a week collecting it not a huge amount about 120tons something like that. On one of the last loads they were tipping they want the FA certificate. No can do we are not FA for grain the merchant knows this but they had already agreed a price, offers quite a reduced rate for not just this load but for everything. All to do with a price drop and too much supply. A quick short phone call from the oul boy, saying to send all the grain back, we'll arrange haulage. Thats the short polite version, he was always very calm and great with people but when he loses it he loses it. . All the grain was taken at the agreed price and cheque was in the post the next week no problems ever after that.

 

[White rabbit]

I don't care for the merits or otherwise of any organisation that is funded by mandatory levies. It's not right. A business should make it's own decisions on what it chooses to invest it's own profits in, not be forced to by the state 'for it's own good'. Either pay for it with taxation or have a commercial model where a producer may choose to pay an annual subscription and not a ridiculous levy applied per tonne/litre or beast.

A business with a virtually guaranteed income it's customers are forced to pay, errr, if that isn't anti-competitive I don't know what is.

I would not care too much about paying the ahdb if it was just small change like cereal boys, what percentage of the bps do they give back to the ahdb,mine is virtually 100%

 

[Steevo]

I don't care for the merits or otherwise of any organisation that is funded by mandatory levies. It's not right. A business should make it's own decisions on what it chooses to invest it's own profits in, not be forced to by the state 'for it's own good'. Either pay for it with taxation or have a commercial model where a producer may choose to pay an annual subscription and not a ridiculous levy applied per tonne/litre or beast.

A business with a virtually guaranteed income it's customers are forced to pay, errr, if that isn't anti-competitive I don't know what is.

PGRO levy is voluntary. I can see sense in that in some ways.

This turns into a similar argument to the BBC licence fee.

 

[ollie989898]

PGRO levy is voluntary. I can see sense in that in some ways.

This turns into a similar argument to the BBC licence fee.

I've not problem with these organisations existing, but forcing people to pay for them is wrong. Should be an annual subscription, same as if you want independent agronomy, trials or the like, like NIAB etc.

 

[Brisel]

I would rather pay a statutory levy than read the sales spiel of what a multinational is peddling this week. AHDB is far from perfect but it does carry out research at all levels of our end of the food chain.

 

[AT Aloss]

Load of feed wheat loaded out yesterday morning. It was sampled on 23rd September at 71.4 kg/hl at 15.3% moisture, so with a bit of drying down to 13.5% since sampling, I reckoned it would easily be over 72 kg/hl. It was rejected at Sedalcol for a bushel weight of 69 kg/hl. It was redirected to BOCM who tipped it at 73.5 kg/hl.

I received a claim against it this morning for a redirection charge. I was going to say on this thread that it's the processors playing silly buggers with the merchants, but now I'm not so sure

 

[Woldgrain Storage]

I reckoned it would easily be over 72 kg/hl. It was rejected at Sedalcol for a bushel weight of 69 kg/hl.

We will happily do you an independent moisture & bushelweight test on a sample FOC if it helps. I assume you are reasonably local to us.

 

[Hindsight]

Load of feed wheat loaded out yesterday morning. It was sampled on 23rd September at 71.4 kg/hl at 15.3% moisture, so with a bit of drying down to 13.5% since sampling, I reckoned it would easily be over 72 kg/hl. It was rejected at Sedalcol for a bushel weight of 69 kg/hl. It was redirected to BOCM who tipped it at 73.5 kg/hl.

I received a claim against it this morning for a redirection charge. I was going to say on this thread that it's the processors playing silly buggers with the merchants, but now I'm not so sure

All the sample results 71.4, 69 and 73.5 were very possibly correct on the individual (small 1 kg?) samples collected. But the bulk may well have been 71 - 72 - the bulk being a lorry load 29 tonnes, or the bulk in the store. All due to variability of a sub sample of a bulk. All explained in the HGCA project report I posted earlier in the thread. It is the archaic trading terms of grain relying on a single small snapshot sample to represent a bulk of variable commodity. Hey ho.

 

[AT Aloss]

We will happily do you an independent moisture & bushelweight test on a sample FOC if it helps. I assume you are reasonably local to us.

Thank you. You're my next port of call with my samples

 

[MrNoo]

All the sample results 71.4, 69 and 73.5 were very possibly correct on the individual (small 1 kg?) samples collected. But the bulk may well have been 71 - 72 - the bulk being a lorry load 29 tonnes, or the bulk in the store. All due to variability of a sub sample of a bulk. All explained in the HGCA project report I posted earlier in the thread. It is the archaic trading terms of grain relying on a single small snapshot sample to represent a bulk of variable commodity. Hey ho.

Yes agreed but surely there would be plenty of cases of the bushel being higher than tested but it never pans out that way does it, always lower, moisture is always higher and protein always lower.
I dont think I have ever had mill results saying the product is better quality than that sampled (despite normally being sampled by anything up to 3 times by different merchants)
Seems law of averages doesnt work out.

 

[Hindsight]

Yes agreed but surely there would be plenty of cases of the bushel being higher than tested but it never pans out that way does it, always lower, moisture is always higher and protein always lower.
I dont think I have ever had mill results saying the product is better quality than that sampled (despite normally being sampled by anything up to 3 times by different merchants)
Seems law of averages doesnt work out.

Agree entirely. That is why I said the terms of trading are archaic. It is one way traffic. I refer again to the HGCA project reports from 2003. All of this was identified. Explained and researched . And it was supposed to be the start point for a new basis of trading grain. Yet nothing happened - apart maybe from some of the self certifying out of central stores (I do not intend getting involved in that). Hey ho.

 

[kiwi pom]

I do think it is poor that wagons tip through the hatch at mills over the course of an hour or so rather than dumped in a pit in one go. It would speed the whole chain up no end, stop delays and make everything much more efficient.

It wont speed it up unless the pit is unloaded quickly into another part of the facility though. Yes the truck will tip in two minutes but the next one will have to wait until the pit can handle their load. They'd need storage for a full days production.
Do these mills run 24 hours?

 

[kiwi pom]

we have test equipment the same as many intakes tested and calibrated on the same network for moisture, proteins, oils, nitrogen and bushel weight - its not cheap but is a good investment imo

we test outloads and attach a outload test and wieghbridge certification to the passports - it states “notify of any difference BEFORE tipping or you accept this analysis “

its rare an intake disagrees, if they do we ask for the load to be returned and independently tested

maybe simply making them aware we are testing with ring calibrated equipment reduces any temptation to try it on as they know they will get a fight ?

Seems like a good way of doing it. Makes sense too, is it not common practice among larger farms/

 

[kiwi pom]

This kind of this has always gone on. Most commodities are prone to it, but usually when there is a contract and there is surplus production. I first learnt of it back in the 70's where canning potatoes, cabbages and sprouts were concerned. The canners would reject arctic loads of potatoes due to 'cracking' when there was no discernible cracked tatties to be seen in the load. Nothing the farmers could do about it. It was a well known dodgy practice even back in those days.

Thank goodness every load of milk is sampled and independently tested between four and six times a month. Every tanker load is tested before unloading and if there is an issue, all samples off that tanker are tested to find the culprit. The only issue is usually the standard of sampling and that varies with the driver's training and demeanour occasionally .

The dairy company take everything out of your tank to and don't return it if they're full when the truck gets there.

I'm familiar with a potato processor here that has factories around the world. Occasionally a manager will be drafted in from abroad and they have to be told that the spuds are all on contract and there are no other spuds available if they do reject a load. This comes as a shock because they're just so used to rejecting stuff that isn't perfect and being able to get more from the open market.