Livestock
Amendments to Saskatchewan’s animal abuse legislation would more than double the maximum fines and quadruple the maximum jail time available for convictions. The amendments, introduced Monday in the provincial legislature, would raise the maximum fines to $25,000 for each convicted offence, up from $5,000 for a first offence and $10,000 for subsequent offences. The maximum […] Read more
Sask. to boost penalties for animal abuse
Sask. rolls out feed, forage funds for drenched ranchers
Rain-soaked livestock producers in Saskatchewan will be eligible for provincial funding to move either feed to livestock or livestock to feed. The province’s new Feed and Forage Program (SFFP), announced Tuesday, pledges help with those transport costs, as well as $30 per acre for producers to reseed hay, forage or pasture land wrecked by “unprecedented” […] Read more
Alta. rolls out price insurance for backgrounders
Cattle backgrounders in Alberta are the second group eligible for a provincial price insurance program meant to insulate against price risk, basis risk and currency risk. Launched Monday, the voluntary Cattle Price Insurance Program-Feeder (CPIP-Feeder) is meant to complement the CPIP offered in September 2009 to cattle feeders on their finished cattle (CPIP-Fed). “In purchasing […] Read more
U.S. firm to buy Maple Leaf’s Burlington pork plant
Up for sale since 2008, Maple Leaf Foods’ Burlington, Ont. pork slaughter and packing plant will be picked up by a U.S. private investment firm for about $20 million. The Toronto food firm on Tuesday announced a deal with an unnamed affiliate of Sun Capital Partners, a major U.S. private investment firm headquartered at Boca […] Read more
Klassen: Feeder cattle trend stalling out
Softer slaughter values in Alberta and stronger barley prices have tempered the upward trend in the feeder cattle market. Steers weighing 840 pounds in southern Alberta sold for $116 last week, which was steady with values earlier in November. Limited discounts were shown for Manitoba cattle as 775-lb. steers brought back $115 in the central […] Read more
N.B. names legislative secretary for agriculture
An insurance broker turned northwestern New Brunswick MP has been named as the new legislative secretary to the province’s agriculture minister. Yvon Bonenfant, the new MLA for Madawaska-les-Lacs, was named Friday as one of two legislative secretaries to Mike Olscamp, who was sworn in last month as the new Tory government’s minister of agriculture, aquaculture […] Read more
CFIA Launches Biosecurity Contest For Youth
Reading Time: < 1 minute The Canadian Food Inspection Agency will mark November as National 4-H Month by launching an online contest for young people to come up with their own ways to promote livestock biosecurity. It asks 4-H members and other young people between ages 12 and 21 to come up with a slogan, a story or lyrics to […] Read more
Hog Numbers Stabilize: StatsCan
Reading Time: < 1 minute Canada’s third-quarter hog inventories as of Oct. 1 are reported at 11.9 million head, down 0.8 per cent from the same date in 2009, according to Statistics Canada. But total inventory is up 0.6 per cent from the second quarter, returning to a traditional fall production pattern, the federal statistics agency said Oct. 28. The […] Read more
New Ear Tag Technology Makes Current Version Look Obsolete
Reading Time: 4 minutes What does the cattle industry have to learn from Walmart? When it comes to low cost, highly effective tracking and monitoring, the answer may be “more than you might think,” said David Moss, chief operating officer of Livestock Identification Services Ltd. Moss is an outspoken supporter of replacing the current radio frequency identification (RFID) cattle […] Read more
Awards Program For Grad Students
Reading Time: < 1 minute The Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute (CAPI), with the support of Farm Credit Canada (FCC) has announced its 2010-11 awards program for graduate students. Applicants must submit a position paper addressing: “The Canadian agriculture and agri-food sector must adapt to a changing world. How can we fundamentally transform how we collaborate and innovate in order to […] Read more
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