Agriculture Canada is in damage-control mode, trying to re-spin its message to farmers following “value creation meetings held late last year. Ag Canada and its partner, the Seed Synergy group, told farmers that Canada’s public plant breeding system was broken and that the federal government was not willing to increase its funding. Farmers were told […] Read more
Author Archives
Seed Synergy’s back story explained
By now, many farmers have heard about an ominous drive, co-ordinated by elements of Canada’s seed industry and financially aided by our federal government, that is attempting to eliminate our right to freely save and reuse our own seed. This story actually begins in 1990 when the Canadian government adopted the UPOV ’78 model law […] Read more
Grain grade system doesn’t discriminate
Contrary to the opinion piece published in the Sept. 11 Financial Post (the one Ottawa policy in NAFTA that even Canadian farmers think is unfair), Canada’s grain grading and variety registration systems are never used to prevent American grain from being imported and sold into Canada. In fact, many southern Alberta feedlots regularly import American […] Read more
Democratic rights
While I respect the Saskatchewan Party’s right to support an end to the Canadian Wheat Board’s single desk, I cannot agree with their support of having western Canadian farmers’ democratic rights stripped away. In the first instance, it is a simple and accepted principle in Canadian society to have, and express, a view on a […] Read more
Grain transport faces heavy weather
Cam Goff, a Hanley, Sask., farmer, says grain transportation matters require serious review. Goff is also a director for the Canadian Wheat Board. It seems to me that it’s time for farmers to take stock of their transportation situation. There are a number of converging issues that require our attention, and decisions to be made […] Read more
Producer loading sites needed – Opinion
Goff is a farmer in Hanley, Sask., and director of the Canadian Wheat Board board of directors. The existence of public loading sites spread across the Prairies gives farmers an additional avenue to ship their grain and provides checks and balances to the grain handling and transportation system. This helps to keep the major players […] Read more
