February 23, 2012

Jeff Simmons Believes in Technology to Help Feed the World

jeffsimmons

Jeff Simmons is the President of Elanco and he has truly made it his personal mission to educate the consumer on why technology is so critical to dealing with the 9 billion people problem in 2050. I had a RealAgriculture.com subscriber send me the link to the below video which is a very simple monologue [...]

WTO Decision on COOL Good For Canadian Livestock Producers

Meat

With the recent ruling by the World Trade Organization declaring elements of the U.S. Country Of Origin Labelling program to be unfair, Canadian livestock producers feel that the first steps have been made in restoring exports lost when the program began. While Canadian producers applaud the move, there is an underlying skepticism that this decision [...]

Is the Canadian Livestock Industry Still Competitive? – Clint Dobson, ALMA

Is the Canadian livestock industry still competitive? We hear this discussion at every conference and coffee shop we participate in. Chances are that we are too hard on ourselves as the industry has survived (relative term) with the drastically higher dollar and increased global competitiveness from South America and the United States. The more negative [...]

Alberta Pork Offers 2 Million Dollar Rebate to Pork Producers

alberta-pork

Alberta Pork is taking unprecedented steps to help its producers deal with the economic hardships faced over the past years. Two million dollars collected by the organization will be refunded back to producers. The Organization made the move after it was unable to find a partner with which to leverage its funds to create programs [...]

Brandon Abel on DDG Movement & Price Outlook

Over the past few years U.S. DDGs have worked their way more and more into Western Canadian livestock rations. The energy value is good, the starch content is less, helps to prevent acidosis in cattle, improved feed conversions and the quality and yield grades of carcasses remain unaffected when switching from traditional rations. Another big [...]

Let’s Talk Pork…oink, Oink, OINK Rebound? – Andrew Campbell

Hog farmers across the country have had it bad for a while. Market crashes, disease and deteriorating consumer confidence have been major issues for pork producers for quite some time.  Running a hog farm is not easy or glamorous. They require an incredible amount of hands on management from farrow to finish. Hogs are hard [...]

Do Ontario Livestock Producers Need a Risk Management Solution Like Alberta – Ernie Hardeman, MPP

Managing risk is a major part of running any farm or livestock operation. Alberta recently tried to aid it’s provincial livestock producers by launching the Cattle Price Insurance Program (CPIP). Recently Ontario Provincial Ag-Critic, Mr. Ernie Hardeman, MPP, questioned why the Ontario government was stalling in implementing a similar program to ensure Ontario producer competitiveness. [...]

Is the Hog Business Drowning in Canada – Harry Siemens

I have never owned a hog or participated in the business at all but from the outside it does appear to be a very tough financial business. I have had several chats with producers that have been in the business for a long time and the concerns are real for the long term sustainability of [...]

Is EU/Can Free Trade Good For Canadian Farmers? – Kathleen Sullivan, CAFTA

After last weeks two posts on the Canada / EU free trade agreement I received several emails from people saying that they believe that this deal will provide limited benefit to the farmer or livestock producer in Canada. The NFU has been very vocal but I find it hard to take much that they say [...]

NCBA10 – Canada’s WTO Challenge of COOL with John Masswohl

Canada and Mexico have taken the issue of country of origin labelling (COOL) to the World Trade Organization (WTO).  We are basically one year into the implementation of COOL and the financial impact is severe.  The impact on the Canada and Mexico livestock markets has been very hurtful. The interesting thing that I found at [...]