2 BULLETIN 937, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



The Canadian plan, in the above sense, is typified in two large com- 

 panies: The United Grain Growers, Ltd., with headquarters at 

 Winnipeg, Manitoba, and the Saskatchewan Cooperative Elevator 

 Company, Ltd., of Eegina, Saskatchewan. These two companies 

 own and operate over 600 country elevators in the three Provinces of 

 Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, in addition to other activities, 

 which will be more specifically referred to in another part of this 

 bulletin. 



Because the Canadian farmers' companies have entered the termi- 

 nal markets and in other ways have carried their marketing activities 

 further than have the single-unit type of farmers' elevators in the 

 middle western section of the United States, some have thought 

 that the American farmers erred in their scheme of organiza- 

 tion and that the Canadian type of organization is the correct 

 type for this country as a whole. It is not the purpose of this 

 bulletin to try to establish which is the correct type, but rather to 

 segregate and distinguish certain conditions and factors relating to 

 the operation of different types of organizations and to assist the 

 reader to a better understanding of cooperative grain marketing as 

 carried on in various parts of the United States and in Canada. 



In the collection of material for this study, personal visits were 

 made to typical organizations representing different types and oper- 

 ating conditions, and numerous interviews were held with persons 

 variously engaged in grain marketing in this country and in Canada. 



THE FARMERS' ELEVATOR MOVEMENT. 



EARLY DEVELOPMENT. 



There is a notable difference in the manner in which the coopera- 

 tive activities of the farmers took concrete form as between the 

 middle western section of the United States and western Canada. 

 In the United States the farmers began by establishing their own co- 

 operatively owned elevators at the local station, trusting to independ- 

 ent commission firms in the terminal markets to furnish an outlet for 

 their grain. The individual grower of grain sold his grain to his own 

 local elevator company, in which he was a stockholder, and it in turn 

 found an outlet for the grain through the regularly established com- 

 mission firms and other trade avenues. In Canada, on the other hand, 

 the farmers first organized for the purpose of securing legislation 

 favorable to direct shipments by individual growers and of correcting 

 alleged trade abuses. There was no attempt by the growers, in the 

 beginning, to establish elevators; their efforts were directed toward 

 securing the privilege of loading their own grain directly into cars 

 and having it sold fairly in the central markets. That a grower 

 might, if he so desired, ship his grain direct seemed to offer at least 

 a check on those elevators which were unreasonable in their charges 



