Through a partnership with Grain Farmers of Ontario, Cereals Canada said in a Thursday release its technical team will analyze the quality of four Eastern wheat classes including Canada Eastern Soft Red Winter (CESRW) for the 2025 crop year. Representative samples are provided through Grain Farmers of Ontario’s annual Ontario wheat harvest survey.

Cereals Canada has been analyzing western wheat quality for over 50 years. The Winnipeg-based organization said in the release the expanded program builds on its “established reputation as the globally recognized independent expert in Canadian grain quality, processing quality, and milling technology.”

“Cereals Canada is the trusted source for quality information on Western Canadian wheat, and our technical experts understand the data needed to support our domestic and global markets,” said Dean Dias, chief executive officer at Cereals Canada. “Our partnership with Grain Farmers of Ontario brings that same level of expertise to Eastern Canadian wheat. This united, comprehensive approach will help to strengthen Canada’s global position as a premier wheat supplier.”

To conduct the annual Harvest Assessment, Cereals Canada works with exporters to obtain representative samples from four wheat classes grown in Western Canada: Canada Western Red Spring (CWRS), Canada Western Amber Durum (CWAD), Canada Prairie Spring Red (CPSR), Canada Western Red Winter (CWRW).

Composite samples of CWRS, CWAD, CPSR, and CESRW from the 2025 wheat harvest will be evaluated for milling performance, flour/semolina quality, and end-product functionality for the New Wheat Crop Report. Depending on the class of wheat, bread, pasta, noodles, and/or cookies are produced in the technical labs at Cereals Canada and thoroughly assessed by the team to evaluate quality.

“Partnering with Cereals Canada on comprehensive milling and baking quality analysis of our wheat harvest helps reinforce the strong reputation of Eastern Canadian wheat in both domestic and international markets,” said Crosby Devitt, chief executive officer at Grain Farmers of Ontario, adding the collaboration also creates new opportunities to strengthen international engagement for Ontario wheat growers.

Cereals Canada said data generated from Harvest Assessment activities will be used to create the 2025 New Wheat Crop Report, which will be released to members, global and domestic customers, and stakeholders on November 18, 2025. The report, which will be available on cerealscanada.ca on its launch day, provides detailed information on milling performance, functionality, and end-use applications of this year’s Canadian wheat quality.

Composite sample assessments of Canada Eastern Hard Red Winter (CEHRW), Canada Eastern Red Spring (CERS), Canada Eastern Soft White Winter (CESWW), and Canada Western Red Winter (CWRW) will also be available for customers upon request, Cereals Canada said. Grain Farmers of Ontario said it also continues to work with SGS Canada on real-time wheat grain grading analysis, with results posted on gfo.ca throughout harvest.

Cereal Canada’s harvest assessment activities in Western Canada are funded in part by the Government of Canada under the Canadian Agricultural Partnership’s AgriScience Program. Grain Farmers of Ontario provided funding for the assessment of Eastern wheat classes.

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The Canadian Food Inspection Agency said in a June 19 notice to industry it’s the first time the virus has been detected in a commercial operation in Canada since 1973.

The disease, caused by the avian paramyxovirus type 1, is highly contagious and can infect both domestic fowl and wild birds. According to the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH), Newcastle Disease can present clinically very similar to avian influenza, including a drop in egg production, respiratory distress, nervous signs (such as tremors, paralyzed wings, head and neck twisting) and diarrhea. Mortality can be variable.

To minimize trade disruptions, the CFIA has set up primary control zones 10 kilometres around each of the infected premises. The agency said the infected birds have been depopulated and a thorough cleaning and disinfection of the premises must be completed to help prevent spread of the virus to other poultry premises.

Poultry producers in the area are encouraged to practice heightened biosecurity as the disease is mainly transmitted by direct contact with diseased or carrier birds. The CFIA said infected birds may shed the virus in their feces, contaminating the environment. The virus can survive for days in litter, feed, water, soil, carcasses, eggs and feathers. The disease spreads rapidly among birds in close confinement.

The virus can also spread unintentionally through the movement of contaminated material, footwear and equipment.

Most commercial broiler, turkey, layer and breeder flocks in Canada are vaccinated for the disease.

The CFIA said Newcastle disease is not a food safety concern.

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The terminal had been operated by Sollio Agriculture since 2021.

Located in a key eastern shipping corridor and at the Port of Quebec, the terminal is a highly efficient facility that will play a critical role in enhancing P&H’s ability to serve its customers from coast to coast, the company said in a release.

P&H said in the release it has also established a new commercial relationship with Quebec-based terminal operator QSL International Ltd. QSL’s presence and expertise in the Port of Quebec “will support the continued success and integration of the terminal into P&H’s national supply chain,” P&H said.

“The addition of a Quebec City terminal is a strong fit for our long-term growth strategy,” John Heimbecker, P&H CEO said in the release. “It allows us to offer even more reliable and efficient service to our customers, while optimizing our logistics and supply chain capabilities across the country.”

P&H has been expanding its grain handling and milling operations in Eastern Canada in the last five years. In 2020, its milling division, P&H Milling, doubled capacity at its Hamilton facility and announced in early 2025 that it plans to further expand capacity with an additional mill and two storage silos. In August 2024, P&H announced the construction of a new marine bulk agricultural terminal at Picton Terminals.

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The show offered a Career Crawl to connect companies with students looking for part-time or full-time employment.

Though young students and graduates often face prohibitive input costs and barriers to owning their own farms, other careers in the agriculture value chain remain open. Some exhibitors courted young jobseekers while others sought more insight.

Landyn Bowen, a recent graduate of the University of Guelph’s Bachelor of Commerce, Food and Agriculture Business program, said he would be interested in farming. However, he said many barriers prevent this from becoming a reality.

“Certainly, I think the biggest one probably would be cost,” he said. “Because obviously, you just graduated from school, so you don’t have that much money, if anything you could be in debt.”

“Trying to buy land, let alone equipment, all the input costs, like it’s just… you’ve really got to crunch the numbers to make it work, even on a large scale at a family operation.”

Bowen currently works part-time on a cousin’s farm while also working full-time as a Precision Ag Specialist for Premier Equipment Ltd. He said farming is something he would pursue, at least on a part-time basis, if startup costs were not so prohibitive.

“It’s always been in the back of my head, but I don’t think it’s ever going to happen,” he said, “because given the price of land and everything … I’d have to find someone good to partner with, I think.”

While some struggle to find a path into farming, others are attempting to fill non-farming agriculture jobs elsewhere in the value chain.

Janice LeBoeuf, the strategic initiative coordinator for the Arrell Food Institute, said one of the current goals for Arrell is to attract students in non-agricultural streams to careers in agriculture.

“We’ve also been trying to figure out how to adjust the educational programs at Guelph to integrate some of these other skills into the ag program,” she said, “but also to integrate information about agriculture into other programs.”

This could include disciplines like engineering or computer science.

“Not having taken computer science, but I assume when you’re taking it you’re like ‘oh, I know that … I could design a medical app or I could develop a social kind of app,” she said.

“I don’t think agriculture is the top thing that might come to the average computer science student’s mind.”

LeBoeuf explained that there are three factors that often keep young people from jobs in agriculture: lack of awareness about opportunities, negative perceptions of the industry and past negative experiences.

LeBoeuf and Ann Kraus, the project coordinator for the University of Guelph’s Food From Thought research program, both said that one of their main reasons for exhibiting at Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show was to get feedback via a poll on what they can do better, such as what kind of courses people are interested in and how to apply research practically.

AgCareers Talent Solutions Manager Katie Hunter spoke at the Career Crawl Lunch during the show on Thursday Sept. 12. She said she saw interest in a variety of agriculture careers across students in attendance.

“The students that are here, lots of them are open to the different opportunities,” Hunter said. She said this included a number of international students.

Like LeBoeuf, Hunter said she felt stigma around the industry often holds people back from pursuing ag careers.

“I think sometimes when people think about agriculture, they maybe are thinking of what you picture of a farmer, which is part of the industry and a very important part of the industry. But there’s also lots of technology, so having a technology background or interest is great.”

She said the jobs are out there if people are looking for them.

“If they’re open to what the opportunities are, I think they’ll be able to find a good path.”

As for those young people interested in farming in the future, her advice was to save up a lot of money and look into working alongside somebody with experience.

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Independent agronomist Aaron Breimer spoke to the curveballs and unpredictability of the past year and offered predictions and suggestions for farmers in the coming seasons. He was a guest speaker at the Pride Seeds Pavillion.

Breimer began his talk by emphasizing the challenges this growing season presented.

“This year especially, mother nature threw lots of curveballs at us,” he said.

He said that some of these anomalies began during the winter.

“We didn’t have a frost,” he said. “We had oats surviving. We had peas surviving.”

He mentioned the increased presence of tar spot in corn as one general challenge this year.

“You know how to scout for tar spot right now? Go find a cornfield. If you can find a cornfield, you’ve got tar spot,” he said.

Later in the day, Great Lakes Grain (GLG) released the findings of its annual Crop Assessment Tour, and results were positive overall.

GLG outlined key findings on corn, soybeans and emerging technologies. Soybeans were found to “remain on track for a strong finish” despite challenges this year like root rot and white mould. Corn has a strong outlook, though it “will require a favourable September to reach maturity,” the report said.

“We’ve got a pretty good crop this year,” GLG Manager Don Kabbes said. “Even with the late planting and some of those things, it’s still gonna be a pretty good crop.”

He mentioned that unpredictable weather early in the year made for a tough start to the growing season.

“Our biggest issue was all the rainfall we had in May and June and some of the crop just didn’t get planted in very nice conditions,” he said. “I think that was probably our biggest issue going in. and then of course, some areas just didn’t get planted at all.”

Now, however, he said that “mother nature’s kind of cooperated” and the crop outlook for the year seems positive.

Like Breimer, he said he had seen tar spot “in many, many areas,” though producers have often managed to control it with fungicide. He saw this as a challenge farmers will have to adapt to.

“I think tar spot is here to stay,” he said. “We’re going to have to have pretty regimented fungicide programs to control it.”

Breimer offered several weather predictions based on current patterns.

“Typically, with La Niña, we’re going to have a dry fall, so that’s good for wheat, but at some point, probably close to the end of October into November, the switch is going to get flipped and it’s going to get stormy.

“I think it’s going to be a tough November when we get there,” he said. “I think we’re going to have good wheat planting conditions … overall, I’m thinking we’re going to have a decent fall to get crop off.”

He also predicted a dry spring in 2025.

“By that point, La Niña’s going to be giving up the ghost,” he said, “and usually when La Niña dies off, we start to go a little but dry.”

Kabbes said he felt positive for the remainder of the 2024 season.

“We have a pretty decent crop coming … we were a little bit behind last year, but it seems to have caught up the last few weeks here as well.”

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“This is a positive step towards bringing more fairness, transparency, and predictability to Canada’s grocery supply chain and for consumers,” the ministers said.

In the statement, Canada’s federal, provincial and territorial Ministers of Agriculture said “years of work and widespread industry participation” has been put into developing the Code of Conduct. Until recently, Walmart and Costco were the only two major grocery retailers to not join the Code of Conduct. Metro and Sobeys signed on last year, while Loblaw agreed this past May after months-long negotiations and a social media-driven campaign by angry consumers urging others to boycott Loblaw stores due to high prices.

Stemming from friction between retailers and suppliers, the code was developed by the industry to promote transparency and fairness, and to solve disputes. It’s been in the works since 2021.

“The goal of the Grocery Sector Code of Conduct is to bring fairness, transparency, and predictability to our grocery sector and supply chain,” a statement from AAFC said after Loblaw joined the Code of Conduct in May. “We believe that uniting all supply chain partners around these principles will produce the best outcomes for the sector and all Canadians.”

—with files from Janelle Rudolph

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Francis Drouin, parliamentary secretary to the minister of agriculture and agri-food, said in a release that 29 projects under the nationwide African Swine Fever Industry Preparedness Program will receive funding.

Provincial projects include improving biosecurity measures, wild pig management activities, retrofits of existing abattoirs, regional preparation for the depopulation and disposal of healthy hogs, and sector analysis, engagement and education tools, said Drouin.

The Canadian Pork Council also received funding to develop an ASFMeter, a portable, low-cost tool for rapidly diagnosing ASF in the field, the organization said in a separate release.

In collaboration with McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., the CPC said “this innovative program aims to revolutionize ASF detection by providing a convenient and effective solution for on-site testing.”

CPC chair René Roy said the AAFC-McMaster University collaboration “brings together expertise in research and technology, ensuring that the ASFMeter meets the rigorous standards required for rapid and accurate ASF detection.”

Roy said the funding underscores the importance of research and development in enhancing biosecurity measures within the swine industry, as well as the jointly proactive approach taken by industry and government to prepare for potential challenges and ensure the sustainability of Canadian pork production.

A detection of ASF in Canada would immediately stop exports of pork products and live pigs, which could significantly impact the pork industry. The Canadian pork industry exports roughly two-thirds of its pork production and millions of live hogs per year.

In 2023, pork exports were valued at $4.7 billion, excluding the 6.7 million live swine exported throughout the year.

ASF has not been found in Canada, but its global spread poses a significant risk to the health of the Canadian swine herd, pork industry and Canadian economy.

Since 2018, ASF has spread through parts of Asia and Europe, and was detected in the Caribbean in 2021.

The $23.4 million preparedness program was launched in 2022 to help Canada’s pork industry prepare for the possibility of an ASF infection here.

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Francis Drouin, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, said in a release 29 African Swine Fever Industry Preparedness Program (ASFIPP) projects across the country will receive funding.

Provincial projects include improving biosecurity measures, wild pig management activities, retrofits of existing abattoirs, regional preparation for the welfare depopulation and disposal of healthy hogs, and sector analysis, engagement and education tools, said Drouin.

The Canadian Pork Council (CPC) also received ASFIPP funding to develop an ASFMeter, a portable, low-cost tool for rapidly diagnosing ASF in the field, the organization said in a separate release.

In collaboration with McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., the CPC said “this innovative program aims to revolutionize ASF detection by providing a convenient and effective solution for on-site testing.”

CPC Chair René Roy said the AAFC/McMaster University collaboration “brings together expertise in research and technology, ensuring that the ASFMeter meets the rigorous standards required for rapid and accurate ASF detection.”

Roy said the ASFIPP funding underscores the importance of research and development in enhancing biosecurity measures within the swine industry, as well as the joint industry/government proactive approach being taken to prepare for potential challenges to ensure the sustainability of Canadian pork production.

A detection of ASF in Canada would immediately stop exports of pork products and live pigs, which could significantly impact the pork industry. The Canadian pork industry exports roughly two-thirds of its pork production and millions of live hogs per year.

In 2023, pork exports were valued at $4.7 billion, excluding the 6.7 million live swine exported throughout the year.

While it has not been found in Canada to date, as it spreads around the globe, it poses a significant risk to the health of the Canadian swine herd, the pork industry, and the Canadian economy, AAFC said.

Since 2018, ASF has spread through parts of Asia and Europe, and was detected in the Caribbean in 2021.

The $23.4 million ASFIPP was launched in 2022 and to help Canada’s pork industry prepare for the possibility of ASF entering the country.

Funding for the projects announced today must be completed by March 31, 2025.

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I remember liking the singer’s voice but didn’t really understand the song. I asked my mom why she was singing about women roaring. As far as I knew, only lions roared.

Mom tried to explain the woman’s rights movement and feminism, but I was still puzzled.

Unlike my mom and her mother before her, I was fortunate to grow up in a time when I was not told or made to feel I couldn’t do certain things because I was a girl. It never occurred to me that some things could be off limits because of gender.

I’ve never felt that I shouldn’t or couldn’t attempt a particular sport, school subject, job or activity. My parents encouraged my sister and I to do well in school, find what interested us and try our best.

We benefitted from the equality struggles of previous generations.

My mother worked, as did most moms and other women I knew at the time. Some worked part-time, some had full-time or professional careers. Some worked with their husbands or partners in the family business.

Later I realized the struggles for equality fought by generations before me were only the beginning. In my youth, few working women owned or ran a business. They were rarely paid the same salary as men for doing the same job, and there was bias about the types of jobs women could do.

This continues to improve, but inequality still exists.

In university, many young women in my program came from farms. They were studying agriculture because they had an interest and wanted to remain within the industry. Many knew they would not take over the farm from their parents, whether because they had a brother, or because they didn’t feel they could manage it financially or physically.

I knew several women with more traditional fathers who wouldn’t even consider transitioning the farm to a woman, even if that woman was their daughter.

But the gap on inequality in the agriculture sector is closing.

The most recent Canadian census of agriculture statistics show the proportion of farmers that are women is greater than ever before, at 30 per cent.

More significantly, the number of women who are sole managers of a farm increased by 26.5 per cent from the previous census. And women aren’t operating small farms. Statistics show the growth in woman operators came primarily from the top three classes, farms with annual revenues ranging from $500,000 to more than $2 million.

In an op-ed for the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, director Vanessa Renoud says census data shows that more women are stepping into leadership roles on farms of all types and sizes. She has first-hand experience, because she works with her father on the family farm near Green Valley, Ontario and is also as a certified crop advisor and crop input consultant with farmers in her area.

She notes that for young women especially, “it’s not always easy to step into roles in this sector, whether it’s part of a farm business or in a wide range of other jobs and careers.”

Lack of mentorship is part of the problem, and that, too, is changing.

Renoud said a new agricultural mentorship program designed specifically for women is now available here. It’s called AgriMentor and offers individual, one-on-one mentorship coaching nationwide for women working in agriculture.

The program was launched as a pilot by Quebec’s organization of farm women, the Agricultrices du Québec, and was a success.

In Ontario, AgriMentor is led by the Union des cultivateurs franco-ontariens (UCFO), with OFA support. Renaud said UCFO will match mentors and mentees, and the program is seeking both. So far there’s no Prairie presence for the program.

She said she didn’t have mentorship earlier in her career, and “although I had colleagues in similar situations that I could lean on, we weren’t able to give each other the type of guidance and insight a more experienced mentor can offer.”

I’m happy to see this type of program being offered. It’s more recognition that women have a greater role to play in the agriculture sector, and there is support to make that happen.

– Kristy Nudds is editor of Farmtario.

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Ten years ago, the news that a food company had bought a predictive crop technology company might have raised a few eyebrows. In McCain’s case, many may have wondered why a company known for its frozen french fries would want one that develops digital technology for farmers.

But in recent years, such purchases are part of a trend that’s taking root in the food industry.

There’s been a paradigm shift in how food and beverage companies secure their financial futures and it is shaping innovation in the agri-food space.

For decades, big food companies purchased raw ingredients and manufactured products for mass distribution to consumers via grocery stores. They hired food scientists to develop new products and tweak existing offerings.

Not much attention was paid to how the raw ingredients were produced, just how much they cost. Increasing shelf space and beating the competition in marketing products with the latest flavour or trendy ingredient, with the lowest cost of production, were keys to the bottom line.

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This is an oversimplified view of the food and beverage industry, but the basic business model for any company that sells a product is to acquire greater market share year-over-year to increase profits.

If a smaller company with an innovative product disrupts market share or is perceived to be a potential threat, it is often purchased by a bigger company. That’s why we have conglomerates such as Nestle, Kellogg, Danone, McCain and Molson Coors, to name a few.

The food and beverage space is highly competitive, and developing and launching a new product often requires an investment of millions. Smaller companies often sell to the big guys to recoup their investment in R&D or because they don’t grow quickly enough to earn the money required for aggressive marketing.

This is where the paradigm shift is taking place.

Within the last five to six years, many large food and beverage corporations have formed their own venture capital units. In addition to buying other companies, they are providing venture capital funds to small companies and start-ups.

That’s what happened with Resson and McCain Foods.

McCain originally invested in Resson nine years ago, long before the food company announced its sustainability vision that includes regenerative farming and its Farms of the Future locations. Resson’s predictive crop technology fits McCain’s “innovation agenda and our ambition to use digital technology to transform agriculture,” Jillian Moffatt, McCain’s chief technology officer said in a release.

The benefit for McCain is that it didn’t have to develop a new business unit from scratch, which would have added years and dollars to the process of creating the technology.

According to a recent article on in-house venture capital funds by large food and beverage companies in Just Food, many companies claim the reason for backing “innovative young companies” with “bags of potential” is to help them grow.

The author writes, “This is not altruism of course but such investments should, in theory, benefit both parties, enabling so-called Big Food to tap into evolving consumer trends and learn more about how to innovate and do business in a more agile manner.”

I’m sure this is true for some big food-start-up relationships, but the cynic in me thinks it’s a cost-effective way for big food to fund innovation and essentially buy it back more cheaply than if it didn’t already have stakes in the game.

Is it a good thing for farmers? I think we need to keep an eye on it.

One positive outcome is the acceleration of innovation in the plant-based food space, which will benefit growers of crops such as oats, lentils and peas by increasing demand. This is likely true for many other commodity crops and livestock products.

But ‘Big Food’ could gain too much control over growers in the future if it takes over the little guys instead of helping them grow.

– Kristy Nudds is the editor of Farmtario. Her article was published in the July 11, 2022 issue.

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