ARD supports retail beef tracking system

Reading Time: < 1 minute IdentiGEN North America has announced it is collaborating with Alberta’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (ARD), Prairie Heritage Beef Producers and Quality Foods, a British Columbiabased grocery retail chain, on a pilot program to test a DNA technology that tracks beef from the ranch to the retail store. IdentiGEN says the pilot program with […] Read more

Reading the signals from the cattle futures market

Reading Time: 3 minutes In my national publication, BEEFLINK, we examine the fundamentals of a market on a weekly basis. The drivers to pricing cattle in Alberta are live cattle futures (LC), feeder cattle futures (FC), currency, cost of gain, feed grains, basis, supply, demand and beef trade. These things all composted together derive into a price for the […] Read more


P.E.I. ag unsustainable on current path: report

Prince Edward Island’s agriculture industry is caught in an unsustainable “vicious circle” leading to ever-diminishing returns, not just in terms of farm profits but in innovation and investment. That’s the assessment of a draft report by the Commission on the Future of Agriculture and Agri-food on Prince Edward Island, released Thursday in advance of a […] Read more

N.L. ag minister named deputy premier

Kathy Dunderdale, the minister for Newfoundland and Labrador’s Forestry and Agrifoods Agency, is the province’s new deputy premier. Dunderdale, who’s also the minister responsible for natural resources, was named to the deputy’s post Friday in a cabinet shuffle by Premier Danny Williams. She has also been appointed as minister for the status of women. As […] Read more


COOL chills live cattle and hog sales to U.S.

(Resource News International) — Sales of live cattle and hogs from Canada to the U.S. under the U.S. government’s new country-of-origin labelling (COOL) laws have suffered since the rule’s implementation, industry sources report. As for Canadian pork and beef product sales, however, the jury remains undecided. “On the live hog front, we are starting to […] Read more

Editors’ Picks: U.S. feedlot suing over COOL

A cattle feedlot owner at Pasco, Wash., is suing his own government over the arrival of country-of-origin labelling (COOL), the Canadian Press reported this week. The Toronto-based national news agency reported Wednesday that Cody Easterday filed suit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in a U.S. District Court last month. His company claims COOL will […] Read more


B.C. to extend worker program to food firms

A pilot project to bring needed entry-level and semi-skilled foreign workers to British Columbia will be expanded to its food processing sector. The province will expand the two-year “strategic occupations” pilot program beyond the tourism, hospitality and long-haul trucking sectors to include food processing, “to help offset a serious staffing challenge,” said Murray Coell, the […] Read more

Maple Leaf posts Q3 loss on recalls

A massive deli meat recall due to this summer’s nationwide listeriosis scare has officially spilled into Maple Leaf Foods’ books, leading it to a net loss of nearly $13 million in its third fiscal quarter. The Toronto food processing giant on Wednesday posted a net loss of $12.92 million on $1.34 billion in sales for […] Read more


Hog inventory down from last year: StatsCan

(Resource News International) — Canada’s hog inventories as of Oct. 1 totalled 12.795 million head, down from 14.36 million at the same time a year ago and lower than the 12.985 million during the quarter ended July 1, figures released by Statistics Canada revealed. The government agency said the decline in hog numbers has been […] Read more

Sask. cow turns up with anaplasmosis: OIE

Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials plan to test a south-central Saskatchewan cattle herd and neighbouring herds for anaplasmosis after one cow turned up positive for the disease. According to the web site of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), CFIA confirmed the disease Oct. 10 in one beef cow out of an 89-cow herd […] Read more