Editor’s note: This the second of a series of columns looking at the lessons learned from the financial crisis of 2008. David Derwin doesn’t have trouble remembering where he was and what he was doing as the financial world fell apart. “I was in the hospital, trying to keep an eye on what was going […] Read more
Author Archives
Glyphosate residues threaten oats
Oats is the crop that received the first U.S. health claim approval. It’s commonly seen as a miracle food that combines whole-grain, high fibre and heart-healthy characteristics. It forms the basis of many of the healthiest breakfast foods available, including oatmeal, Cheerios and granola bars. But recently it’s been hit by multiple claims that glyphosate […] Read more
Remembering the lessons from the 2008 financial crisis
Do you remember where you were 10 years ago when we fell into a worldwide financial crisis? (It still doesn’t have a generally accepted name, with the Great Contraction, the Financial Crisis and the Great Recession being most commonly used.) What did it mean to you and your farm? What lessons have you drawn from […] Read more
Nothing new in US NAFTA position: Class 7 will be at the core of any deal
That's good and bad news, but at least we know what the US wants
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue has been remarkably consistent about his country’s main agricultural concern – and demand – with Canada that it wants dealt with in a new NAFTA: Class 7 milk has shut off a growing market for U.S. dairy exports, and it has led to an increase of Canadian exports into […] Read more
Pesticide residues vex food firms
Food companies are struggling with costly challenges launched by anti-pesticide activists. While they are not facing mega-costs like Bayer is facing with the recent US$289 million jury judgment against Monsanto, activist lawsuits and claims are causing food companies to spend time and resources on lawyers and repackaging. General Mills, the food and cereals colossus that […] Read more
Supply management in trouble even if it survives NAFTA
The worst outcome from any North American Free Trade Agreement deal would be a supply management system that survives but is weakened. Saving free access to the United States, if that happens, will be a blessed relief for all the Canadian crop, livestock and food businesses. And if dairy supply management manages to survive, even […] Read more
U.S. under pressure to sign with Canada
Who’s calling whose NAFTA bluff? Has U.S. President Donald Trump forced Canada to buckle to his bluster and bravado, or have supporters of Canada and preserving the pact forced Trump to give up most of his ambitions and accept tinkering rather than revolution? “It is not a forgone conclusion that Congress will accept a bilateral […] Read more
Neonic ban causes widespread concern
Concern about losing neonicotinoid pesticides spreads much further than the canola industry as farmers coast to coast fret over how they could be affected by the threatened ban. “We have to be doing something every year,” Prince Edward Island potato grower Ray Keenan said about insect control on his farm. Wireworms can be a serious […] Read more
Proposed neonic ban frustrates Ontario farmers
Province imposed restrictions in 2013-14, requiring independent agronomists to write ‘prescriptions’ for neonic use
Ontario farmers are frustrated that they haven’t been given enough of a chance to prove they can safely use neonicotinoids. They think the best management practices adopted a few years ago have eliminated most of the threat from former application methods for the crucial insecticides. “We dealt with that,” said Barry Senft, chief executive officer […] Read more
European neonic ban cut canola yields: study
Yield losses ranged from less than one percent to more than 20 percent, depending on the degree of insect pressure
The European Union’s ban on neonicotinoids has been a costly, environmentally dubious and regressive mistake, argues a study conducted for the EU’s farming and agriculture industries. The author also voices the same perplexity with the EU regulators’ resistance to comparative studies that many Canadian farmers and agriculture people are now expressing about Health Canada’s Pest […] Read more
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