By most accounts the 2010 NCBA convention in San Antonio was a huge success. This was my first NCBA meeting so it is fitting that we talked to Anne Dunford a wily veteran of the NCBA festivities. Anne wrapped up the week and talked about what she thought were the major things to be pulled… Read More
Category: Trade
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… Read More
Being someone that has served on boards for a couple different agricultural associations, I respect people that commit the time necessary to make a difference. Whatever your beef politics are it is important to understand the work that happens behind the scenes. Trying to run your own business and also commit the time to cattle… Read More
With the losses that have been suffered in the feeding industry in 2010 it is no surprise that there is a very keen interest in what the analysts are saying about the cattle market in 2010. Before I attended the NCBA convention many people told me that the highlight of the show is the Cattlefax… Read More
One of the great things about attending the NCBA convention is that you get a chance to hear what some of the NCBA analysts an staff have to say about the industry. I was very fortunate to get a chance to talk with Gregg Doud. Gregg Doud is the Chief Economist at the National Cattlemans… Read More
This is my first trip the NCBA convention and I have been amazed at the scope of the convention. The first person that I had a chance to interview was Sara Brown, Livestock & Production Editor, Beef Today. I asked Sara what a couple of the main issues were in the beef business in the… Read More
I am finding more and more ranchers and feeders are struggling to find the answers to their short term profitability issues. I just hope that if ALMA has success there is enough people in the industry still to benefit from the hard work. At the Tiffin conference I really detected frustration from producers on how… Read More
Photo is courtesy of BugMan50 Dennis McKnight, The Innovators, spoke at Tiffin Conference 2010 about the ability of the Canadian beef industry to compete globally. Dennis has clients around the world who he assists in developing markets for their products. Dennis believes that Canadian beef can compete but we may need to rethink how we… Read More
I talked to Dustin Gosnell, Director of Strategic Planning and Corporate Policy, Canadian Wheat Board about GM wheat and the CWB’s position on the latest WTO issues. Agricultural trade issues are really sensitive and controversial issues right now. Never mind the trade issues that North America has with China and the other BRIC countries but the… Read More
This is part two of my interview with the President and CEO of the Alberta Livestock Meat Agency (ALMA), Gordon Cove. In this interview I asked questions provided to me by producers. I gathered questions from Twitter and Agriville and asked them in no particular order to Mr. Cove. I would suggest that many people at the… Read More
When an industry struggles financially, it becomes necessary to re-evaluate how business is done. The beef industry has struggled since the discovery of BSE in 2003 and the pork industry has felt the financial pain from the H1N1 pandemic. One solution being circulated in the coffee shops across the country is to make either of… Read More
It seems that trade issues are at the forefront right now in Canadian agriculture. We have country of origin labelling (COOL) and a volatile Canadian dollar to keep us busy. We now also have a serious situation in China where the Chinese have decided Canadian canola may be not fit to enter Chinese ports without… Read More
Every stream of media has covered and analyzed the economic turmoil that the globe has experienced over the past twelve months. I have heard more and more that people believe that agriculture is immune to any downturn in the economy. Is there such a thing? Is it possible that agriculture is one of the special… Read More
There was a time when agriculture and food were sacred topics to the public. People were either on the farm or one generation removed which instilled a connection to the source of the food that we eat. In the past five years that has definitely changed as many food activists have begun attacking the large… Read More
MCOOL has become a reality for the US, Canadian and beef industry. Sometimes it is beneficial to better understand an issue or situation by stepping back and examining how we got here. I asked Dennis Laycraft of the Canadian Cattleman’s Association at the International Livestock Congress to provide me with a history of the MCOOL legislation and what could… Read More