Crop supply retail chain FS Partners and its owner, ag co-operative Growmark, plan to put up an expanded fertilizer centre in southwestern Ontario to supply both farmers and other retailers. Growmark announced its plans Wednesday for a new 15,000-tonne capacity facility to be built at Ayr, Ont., about 20 km south of Kitchener. The Illinois-based […] Read more
Growmark, FS plan SW Ontario fertilizer store
Richardson cranking up canola crush, throughput at Lethbridge
Expansion plans finalized, underway at crush plant
Reading Time: 2 minutes Agri-food firm Richardson International plans to put up $120 million to dial up the processing capacity of its canola-crushing plant in southern Alberta by over 55 per cent. Privately held, Winnipeg-based Richardson says the new upgrades at its Lethbridge plant are expected to boost its peak annual crush to over 700,000 tonnes of canola per […] Read more
University of Saskatchewan develops vaccine for PED
Reading Time: < 1 minute It has taken Saskatchewan veterinary researchers less than a year to develop, test and prototype a vaccine for PEDv, a devastating hog disease that has killed more than eight million pigs and cost pork producers $400 million worldwide. PEDv hit the United States in 2013 and spread to Canada in 2014. It was first discovered […] Read more
Agrium’s CPS agrees to shed four Alberta retail sites
Agrium’s Crop Production Services (CPS) arm will need to sell four ag retail sites in eastern Alberta to close on its deal to buy an independent western Prairie retail chain. The federal Competition Bureau on Thursday announced an agreement with CPS dealing with the company’s planned purchase of Andrukow Group Solutions Inc. which operates 18 […] Read more
Agrium, PotashCorp in merger talks
Canadian fertilizer giants Agrium and PotashCorp confirmed Tuesday they’re in “preliminary discussions” toward a possible merger-of-equals. Calgary-based Agrium and Saskatoon-based PotashCorp emphasized in separate statements Tuesday that no decision has yet been made on whether to go ahead with such a merger and no agreement has yet been reached. “There can be no assurance that […] Read more
Study points to payoff from cattle research, beef marketing
Economists use ‘econometric simulation model’ and find every $1 in checkoff investment generates a $14 return
Reading Time: 2 minutes A new study has found Canadian cattle producers receive a $14 benefit for every $1 in national checkoff fees invested in research and marketing activities. The study, by University of Alberta ag economists James Rude and Ellen Goddard, examined the period from 2011-12 to 2013-14. It updates a similar 2010 study (covering the period from […] Read more
Viterra books lower first-half revenues for Glencore
“Average” crops and lower prices on the Prairies in the first half of 2016 led to results “substantially below” those in the year-earlier period for Viterra’s Canadian operations. Viterra’s owner, Swiss commodity mining/marketing firm Glencore, on Wednesday reported a nine per cent drop in revenues across its global agricultural products business, from $10.74 billion in […] Read more
Fines now an option for pig traceability enforcement
Canadian hog producers who don’t follow the federal requirements for animal identification and tracking of animal movements could now be fined for non-compliance, though it’s expected such fines would be a “last resort.” The Canadian Food Inspection Agency on Wednesday announced new amendments to the Agriculture and Agri-Food Administrative Monetary Penalties Regulations, allowing CFIA-designated officials […] Read more
Saskatchewan adds new secretary for farm irrigation
A rookie MLA in the Saskatchewan Party caucus has been promoted to a legislative secretary post with responsibility for expansion of the province’s farm irrigation systems. Premier Brad Wall on Tuesday named Warren Kaeding, the MLA for Melville-Saltcoats since April, as legislative secretary to the minister of agriculture, for irrigation expansion. Kaeding was previously a […] Read more
Field testing underway on Canadian PED vaccine
Field testing is underway and a corporate partner on board for development of a made-in-Saskatchewan vaccine to protect pigs against porcine epidemic diarrhea (PED). The University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization-International Vaccine Centre (VIDO-InterVac) said Monday its prototype vaccine, first announced last year, has moved into field testing in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Manitoba […] Read more
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