Brian MacLeod

Readers may have noticed the arresting illustration on the front page of last week’s Western Producer, leading off our three-part series on the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement, CETA, between Canada and the European Union. It was a striking image. Reporters from across Glacier FarmMedia, which owns The Western Producer, worked on the project. Art director […] Read more

Next week marks Canadian Agricultural Safety Week (March 13-19). It’s well known that agriculture is a dangerous profession. The pages of The Producer have carried stories of tragedy too many times. Last year, Farm Living editor Karen Morrision focused on keeping children safer on the farm. This year, we are carrying stories on several topics, […] Read more

There is more to the American election than the crazy Republican presidential nomination race. At issue for Canadian agriculture is whether the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal will survive the next administration. All 12 nations — including Canada, the United States and Japan — have signed the deal, but it now must be ratified within two years […] Read more

It is interesting to watch the reaction in Prince Edward Island to the decision to include farms under the Workers Compensation Act by Jan. 1, 2017. There hasn’t been any. So far, at least. The announcement was just made Feb. 19, but as of the time of writing Feb. 22, there has been no outburst […] Read more

There are two new videos aimed at spreading agriculture’s message. One, Ag more than ever – get in the food conversation, was produced by Farm Credit Canada on behalf of the Ag More Than Ever campaign, in which Glacier Farm Media, which owns The Western Producer, is a partner. It’s about two minutes long. The […] Read more

By the time you read this, the 2016 Agricultural Equipment Technology Conference in Louisville, Kentucky, will be over. So will the Tactical Farming conference in Calgary. But the best is yet to come. Western Producer managing editor Michael Raine was in Louisville covering the latest developments in agricultural engineering. Mike lives for this kind of […] Read more

Sascha-Kate Marskell’s tale in last week’s Western Producer about being mauled by a 1,740 pound cow was a riveting read. You couldn’t help but imagine the terror on the farm at that moment, with the cow’s hoofs on her back holding her down. Fortunately, Sascha-Kate survived that incident and recovered from nasty injuries. (For those […] Read more

Each week, our editorial board meets to discuss the topic and position we’ll take for our Page 10 editorial. Last week’s meeting was particularly animated, as we discussed Sask-atchewan Pulse Growers’ pending decision on making its mandatory checkoff voluntary. It’s the only group left in Saskatchewan with a mandatory checkoff. Farmers can obviously do what […] Read more

The Western Producer’s on-line readers made it clear what they were interested in this year: Bill 6, cool machines, a little politics, weather and weeds. And, sadly, there was tragedy. In 2015, producer.com drew almost 3.5 million page views. Here are the 10 stories you read the most. Our 10th most read story, headlined “More […] Read more

So, we had the discussion. The MC talk. That’s Merry Christmas. Each week our editorial board gets together to discuss possible topics, then we debate the appropriate stand we should take and how the argument should be made. After the outline is set, someone volunteers to write the editorial. So D’Arce McMillan, Terry Fries, Bruce […] Read more