Half a dozen national farm organizations and their members are raising concerns about unintended consequences from the federal government’s Underused Housing Tax (UHT) that took effect last year. The Canadian Federation of Agriculture, Canadian Cattle Association, National Cattle Feeders Association, Fruit and Vegetable Growers of Canada, Ontario Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association, and Canadian Canola… Read More
Category: Canadian Agriculture Policy
Tara Mulhern Davidson has been ranching for over 15 years, and has had to manage through several severe droughts in the last five. The perpetual dryness is weighing on planning for the long-term, she says, but there’s also the every day challenges of working with a living commodity. Davidson’s Lonesome Dove Ranch is based at… Read More
When it comes to nitrous oxide emissions, there are many complex formulas that can be used to determine what is going on in the fields. Abby Sim, field technician at Olds College of Agriculture and Technology, says this is precisely why the Smart Farm at the college decided to look at estimating nitrous oxide emissions…. Read More
Details and timelines have yet to be determined, but the federal and provincial governments in Alberta and Saskatchewan have agreed to move ahead on offering AgriRecovery disaster relief programs for livestock producers affected by drought in 2023. Both Prairie provinces submitted requests for AgriRecovery assessments in July. Any program under AgriRecovery is cost-shared on a… Read More
The prime minister and his cabinet are in Charlottetown, PEI this week for their first retreat since the major cabinet shuffle in late July. At some point before Parliament resumes in September, possibly this week, the PM is expected to publish a new round of mandate letters for each member of cabinet, including Lawrence MacAulay,… Read More
Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay took the opportunity to drive a combine while visiting a Saskatchewan grain farm between Regina and Saskatoon this week. MacAulay and some of his staff dropped in at Stone Farms near Davidson, Sask., for about an hour and half on Tuesday. “I’ve been inviting the minister of the portfolio to come… Read More
In the near term, navigating severe and prolonged drought is a key focus on the Canadian Cattle Association. But in the ongoing and longer-term, there is concern at the CCA regarding what’s happening on the trade and legislative fronts in Ottawa. General manager of the Canadian Cattle Association, Ryder Lee, points to the lack of… Read More
The Wheat Growers Association (formerly known as the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association) has launched a young farmer mentorship program with the support of Canadian Pacific Kansas City Rail (CPKC). The focus of the mentorship is to encourage young farmers to get informed and involved within agriculture policy, the organization says. Saskatchewan director and treasurer… Read More
Federal Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay announced a federal investment of over $4 million in Saskatoon on Tuesday for agronomy research through the Western Grains Research Foundation (WGRF). It will be matched with more than $1.9 million from WGRF itself, and $1.5 million from grower groups and industry partners, bringing total funding for the second iteration… Read More
No matter how you slice it, Ontario’s Ford government took liberties with the rules when it decided to re-draw the boundaries of Toronto’s Greenbelt. (You can read the auditor general’s report about how many liberties, here). A staunch supporter of farmland preservation, Peggy Brekveld, president of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, says that there’s no doubt… Read More
Urban sprawl is a real threat to farmland long-term in many areas of Canada and the U.S., but our attitude about developing farmland is littered with hypocrisy. As I see it, farmers are in the land business as much as the food production business and that is the reality we tend not to discuss openly…. Read More
Government policies that promote the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) are unlikely to make a major dent in future demand for renewable diesel, says an author of a recent report on the future of the renewable diesel market. Unlike biodiesel, renewable diesel can be directly substituted in diesel engines. Production capacity in the U.S. is… Read More
A three-year pilot program will begin this September to help reduce the administrative burden of accessing the Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program. The Recognized Employer Program (REP) will first be made available to agricultural workers this September before a wider rollout in January 2024. The program will be available to those companies who regularly access… Read More
The Conservative Party of Canada and leader Pierre Poilievre have clearly made the Clean Fuel Regulation (CFR) a target in political messaging, tagging it as the “second carbon tax.” For advocates of biofuels in farm country and Ottawa this should be a wake-up call for the longer term development of the biofuel sector in Canada…. Read More
There has been a tremendous amount of fanfare and anticipation regarding the intended expansion of canola crushing capacity on the Canadian Prairies, driven mainly by expected demand for renewable diesel across North America. Companies such as Cargill, Richardson, Federated Co-op, Viterra, Bunge, and Ceres Global Ag have all jumped into the fray, announcing hundreds of… Read More