Cargill’s AgHorizons farm customers now have the ability to sign a grain delivery contract online, the company announced today. Cargill is the first line grain company in Canada to offer the service. Fran Burr, assistant vice-president of marketing for Cargill Limited says, “..What we’re hearing right now is that (farmers) want simplified solutions when it… Read More
Category: Ag Business
Whether it’s the drop in commodity prices or the pace at which machinery sheds have been restocked in the past three years, global machinery sales have slowed considerably. On Deere & Co earnings call this week the company stated, For fiscal 2014, the company expects sales to decrease 6%, and to be down ~8% for… Read More
Farmers across Western Canada may notice two very remarkable things on the Prairie landscape soon — stand alone CLAAS dealerships and brightly coloured Xerion tractors. Caterpillar recently announced its shift out of the agriculture market, which started a chain reaction that will see CLAAS, a company who had a distribution deal for its Lexion combines… Read More
Cornelia Kreplin has a history of accepting opportunities. After training in veterinary medicine and receiving a graduate degree in veterinary reproductive patholgy, Kreplin took a career with Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development, serving as the provincial reproductive pathologist and later as Alberta’s Chief Provincial Veterinarian. In 1999, Kreplin accepted an incredible opportunity to build a… Read More
The federal government can do something to help Ontario’s $900-million mushroom sector — that is, extend or change the temporary foreign worker program. Such a change might help other agri-food sectors too and give new skilled Canadians a productive place in our society. The agri-food sector’s struggle with labour is widely known. Canadians like to… Read More
Consumers are farmers’ customers…eventually. But in between the farmer and the consumer is an entire supply chain, from processor, to transporter, to wholesaler and retailer, each taking their pound of flesh. Yet, if consumers demand certain items, production systems or products, it’s largely farmers, not the entire supply chain, that must adapt and shoulder much… Read More
When it comes to Canada’s $27-billion food waste problem, what’s actionable on your farm? How can you take measures to reduce it…and should you bother? Martin Gooch thinks so. On behalf of his firm, Value Chain Management International, he’s co-authored a new study, Developing an Industry-Led Approach to Addressing Food Waste in Canada, to try… Read More
To some, “accepting risk” is an excuse to not fully understand personal finance, and it’s no wonder, with an abundance of numbers, statistics and graphs, economics can seem daunting to some or overly dull to others. And for women, as Gwen Paddock, national manager of agriculture and agribusiness for RBC Royal Bank, points out, the challenge may… Read More
The newly-minted provincial agriculture minister for Ontario, Jeff Leal, has not changed policy or regulation on neonicotinoid seed treatments. Let’s get that out of the way right now. Will the government soon step in, requiring more paper work, perhaps a licensing systems and more monitoring or rules around the use of neonics on corn and… Read More
Do you ever wonder where equipment manufacturers get their great new ideas? While some will get inspiration from their own on-the-farm experiences, some new innovations are dreamed up on paper long before they ever hit the field. Still other manufacturers use a collaborative approach, seeking out feedback from their customers and problem solving for them…. Read More