He says in an article commenting on the 8.4 per cent milk price increase the commission has authorized that the way data is collected is “worthy of a young university student at best.”
That’s because the commission asks a selected group of dairy farmers to self-report their production costs. That becomes the basis for pricing Canadian-produced milk which is and has been the highest in the world.
Charlebois also said it’s not right that the commission did not publish the data upon which it based its current price increase.
He said both consumers and the Canadian dairy industry will suffer because of the increase.
Consumers will have to pay more, including those at or below the poverty line. Farmers and processing companies will lose market share to goat milk and other competitors and Charlebois speculated that illegal milk imports will increase.
