Manitoba combines back in fields

Farmers in Manitoba’s central, southwest and eastern regions were able to push forward with harvest as the weather dried up last week, the province reported Monday in its weekly crop update. Relatively few canola acres, especially in the northwest, remain unharvested, while yields on harvested crop are just under 30 bushels per acre on average. […] Read more

Northeastern Sask. behind curve on harvest

Harvest in Saskatchewan’s northern grain belt remains far behind the rest of the province, leaving the harvest 87 per cent complete provincewide, the agriculture department said yesterday. That’s up from 78 per cent last week and from the five-year average of 79 per cent, but down from 92 per cent at the same time last […] Read more


Alta. to fund barley growers’ intervention

After announcing it would file for intervener status in the federal government’s latest legal battle to end the Canadian Wheat Board’s single desk for barley, Alberta’s provincial government pledged to back another intervention also. The Western Barley Growers Association, based in Airdrie, Alta., will get up to $50,000 from the province toward the cost of […] Read more

N.B. fine-tunes wind map

New Brunswick’s provincial government has put up a new, more detailed wind map showing areas best suited to wind energy projects — and zones that are off limits to wind turbines. The province’s new Technical Wind Power Potential map builds on the wind atlas released in March, targeting regions more precisely and removing zones such […] Read more


Bevo Agro says behind on bond repayment

B.C.-based greenhouse supplier Bevo Agro Inc. reported Monday that it’s in no position yet to pay back $5 million it owes on a bond it issued to a Vancouver private equity firm in 2003. The debenture issued to Banyan Capital Partners matured Sept. 24 and the $5 million principal is now due, Bevo Agro reported […] Read more

Agricore CEO, VP join Ridley board

Having dealt himself out of a job by merging his company into Viterra, Brian Hayward is now chairman of Winnipeg feed maker Ridley, Inc. Hayward, until June this year, had been the chief executive officer of Canada’s largest grain handler, Winnipeg-based Agricore United, but stepped down after helping coax Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, the no. 2 […] Read more


Ottawa boosts 2007-08 CWB initials

Prairie wheat and barley growers can expect a harvest of adjustment payments in the next three weeks — and the Canadian Wheat Board is already pressing for more. The federal government today announced it has approved increases to the Canadian Wheat Board’s 2007-08 initial payments — increases of around 20 per cent for wheat and […] Read more

Crop prices drive farmland values: FCC

Higher commodity prices have been written into the values of farmland across much of Canada in the first half of 2007, leading to the country’s biggest overall increase in ag land values in five years, Farm Credit Canada reported Monday. The federal farm lending agency said in its farmland values report that the value of […] Read more


No cross-border travel for Sask. birds

A ban on movement of live birds out of Saskatchewan is among the latest biosecurity restrictions in place following last week’s confirmation of a strain of avian flu on a south-central poultry farm. The farm, found between the communities of Lumsden and Regina Beach northwest of Regina, is the centre of an “infected region” with […] Read more

No mediated solution for CN, grain companies

Mediation between six grain shippers and CN in the level-of-service dispute between the companies and railroad ended without a resolution, the lead shipper said Friday. The Canadian Wheat Board (CWB) said in a bulletin that the Canadian Transportation Agency will have to determine the outcome of the shippers’ complaint against CN. The shippers had filed […] Read more