Ont. soybean growers want back at merger table

Three weeks after walking away from merger talks with Ontario’s wheat and corn growers’ groups, members of Ontario Soybean Growers say they’d rather not call off the engagement yet.

About 100 soybean growers at the OSG Committee Members’ meeting Wednesday in London, Ont., brought “multiple” resolutions forward from several districts, asking OSG’s board to reconsider resuming talks toward a memorandum of understanding (MOU).

The OSG board had voted in late November to withdraw from the MOU talks, which were to lead up to the forming of one organization with the Ontario Corn Producers’ Association and Ontario Wheat Producers’ Marketing Board.

However, after hearing from farmers at the Wednesday meeting, the OSG board met and voted unanimously to resume MOU talks by meeting with the OCPA and OWPMB executives and management.

“Growers presented a very balanced view of what an amalgamated organization could look like and the opinions expressed today will be taken into consideration as this renewed effort moves forward,” OSG chairman Leo Guilbeault said in a press release late Wednesday.

The OSG board had decided in November that the proposed merger structure and process “would not have been as beneficial to soybean growers” as the status quo and OSG’s stand-alone strategic plan.

Although OSG said in its release Wednesday that MOU negotiations will be resumed, it’s not yet clear whether the corn and wheat growers’ groups will want to resume talks immediately.

The corn and wheat groups had said in November that they would suspend all talks on amalgamation until February. That’s when county and regional meetings wrap up, where the situation was to be discussed among members.