Call me old fashioned, but I’m siding with dairy farmers in the latest attack against supply management. And I hope any farmer who feels the same way will take action and let their elected officials (particularly at the federal level) know how they feel. Over the past couple of weeks, a fight has emerged between… Read More

It’s been a long, cold, snowy winter. I get that. You get that. The railways also get that, apparently. And, on one hand, would like to tell you that the dismal service Western Canadian farmers and Canada’s agriculture industry is receiving is the weather’s fault and then, in the same breath wants to “work together”… Read More

Viterra Inc. and Cigi (Canadian International Grains Institute) announced today that Viterra is investing $1 million to support Cigi in its ongoing efforts to promote Canadian field crops to customers in domestic and international markets. As a result of this partnership, Cigi’s main classroom with be renamed the “Viterra Knowledge Centre.” From the press release:… Read More

By Jenny Dewey Rohrich Editor’s note: This post first appeared on Jenny’s site PrairieCalifornian. Click here to visit her site or follow her on Twitter as @PrairieCA This weekend I was cruising social media and I was quite shocked to see a Chico News & Review article entitled, “Llano Seco drops Organic label“. Now to… Read More

The Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture hosted the 2014 Agriculture Trade Summit in Saskatoon in early February. It was there that I met Jennifer Higginson, deputy director of the trade negotiations division of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. Higginson’s presentation dealt largely with the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), citing an eventual elimination of over 95%… Read More

I suspect there will be a lot of angst over the new federal farm review and forecast – even though statistically, it’s a good news story. The report, released last week, showed farmers produced 96.5 million tonnes of grain in 2013. That’s a major leap over the previous year’s relatively dismal 76.7-million tonne crop, which… Read More

Correlation does not mean causation, but it can be a good place to start investigating a link. And, sometimes, that apparent link turns out to be valid. Earlier this week, the CFIA confirmed that PEDv DNA detected in hog feed (which contained hog plasma) was capable of causing infection. CFIA’s statement, released earlier this week… Read More

The words “Made in Canada branding campaign” had hardly dried on the page of federal finance minister Jim Flaherty’s Economic Action Plan last week before marketing experts started taking shots at it…even though they didn’t know what it was about. They couldn’t know, because the government itself didn’t — all the budget contained was one… Read More