Reading Time: 3 minutes The children and I have a map marked with every road I drove in the 20 years in the 1980s and 1990s I spent speaking about animal welfare in Canada. There were a few empty spots, but those travels included hundreds of farm stops and thousands of participants. It was my mission to bring the […] Read more
The cattle industry hasn’t fully embraced animal welfare
The cattle sector has come a long way but there are still areas to be addressed and it should be leading the way
Data from your farm has value and shouldn’t be given away
But under current rules, the end-user of the data is the owner, which means farmers are giving away an increasingly valuable commodity
Reading Time: 3 minutes There are many questions surrounding the use of data for and from farmers. Who owns the data? What is required? How does this benefit me as a farmer? I took to the streets with these questions as part as an ongoing quest to clarify just what it is that farmers may expect and more importantly, […] Read more
New wheat-marketing system isn’t just a mess — it’s a great big mess
With Canada’s wheat selling at a discount to Russia’s, it’s time to admit the new open market isn’t working as it should
Reading Time: 3 minutes Critics of the Canadian Wheat Board used to routinely point to published price quotes for U.S. Dark Northern Spring (DNS) wheat from the Pacific Northwest (PNW) and assume that was a benchmark price for all wheat sold in the world. If the board got less, it must have screwed up, said the critics. In fact, […] Read more
Lessons to learn from Quebec’s agriculture and agri-food industry
Canada is about food and Quebec is about processing — employing 475,189 in 2,100 facilities, most co-operatively owned
Reading Time: 3 minutes I spend a lot of time in Quebec and find the culture and the history of the province fascinating. It is in many regards, Canada’s little bit of Europe and the feel in the country is cosy. What most folks don’t see as they travel the countryside past long narrow tracks of land, vineyards and […] Read more
A new era of watchful food consumers
Consumers don’t just want to know more about how their food is produced — some want a very detailed report card
Reading Time: 3 minutes Last month, McDonald’s USA announced a “multi-faceted effort called ‘Our Food. Your Questions’” in which it invites people to submit their food questions via social media. “We’re proud of the food we serve our 27 million U.S. customers every day, yet we know people have unanswered questions,” said Kevin Newell, executive vice-president, chief brand and […] Read more
Dancing with Mother Nature and leaving a legacy of sustainability
Being sustainable means focusing on a triple bottom line — the people, the land and the business
Reading Time: 3 minutes My husband John and I have always been drawn to the land. He is a third-generation rancher here in Canada; I grew up on my parents’ small mixed farm. I am a microbiologist by trade and a rancher by inclination. John and I possess a strong land ethic as well as a keen ecological awareness; […] Read more
Farmers know the true cost of producing real food
In a fast-food world, farmers and ranchers understand the hard work necessary to get food on the table
Reading Time: 3 minutes Our farm is deeply personal to us. It is more than just where we work and where we live. This is our life’s work; our land and animals become our life’s masterpiece. Taking care of the land, raising healthy animals and educating the next generation of stewards on our land will be our legacy. The […] Read more
U.S. local corn prices dip below $2 in some areas
A review of ending stocks in the past does not give much hope for a turnaround
Reading Time: 2 minutes Even before the current U.S. Farm Bill was adopted, we shared our concern that a $4-plus plateau in corn prices, which was being widely predicted, was in all likelihood no plateau at all. A year ago many were predicting corn would average $4.50 a bushel, partly because of ethanol demand and partly because production costs […] Read more
Trade deals open doors, but meeting customers’ needs is the key
Europe has agreed to lower its tariffs, but will only accept beef raised without growth promotants and beta-agonists
Reading Time: 3 minutes Trade agreements have changed in nature. Canada once went through a formal process via GATT or WTO. Now it is first come, first serve. This has been both favourable and limiting for our country. Trade liberalization is just that — the freeing of trade. This transcends from country to country and even penetrates from business […] Read more
The four fallacies of sustainable food production
Intensive, large-scale production employing the latest technology is key to feeding a hungry world
Reading Time: 4 minutes The view that we need to change how we produce food in the name of sustainability has become ubiquitous in Canada and other developed countries. Indeed, spurred on by the perceptions of some consumers, the food industry has become keenly interested in how farmers produce food. They want to know about their carbon footprint; animal […] Read more
Cyber-Savvy Farmer
