LANDMARK, Man. – Hog production is still going full-steam at Marg Rempel’s farm, as is the flow of red ink. Because so few details are available about new federal hog industry aid programs, Rempel is putting off until Christmas the agonizing decision about whether to close the barns on her 500-sow, farrow-to-finish operation. “By the […] Read more
Ed White
Stories by Ed White
Hog sector fears dollar parity
Talk of the Canadian dollar possibly reaching par with the American dollar is sending shivers down the spines of many Canadian farmers. But some non-bank analysts are not convinced that the loonie is likely to reach parity with the U.S. dollar. “Maybe it is. It feels a bit like it’s going that way,” acknowledged broker […] Read more
Greyhound threatens halt to rural service
Farmers and seniors could be hit hard if Greyhound Lines pulls out of rural Manitoba, rural representatives say. Greyhound Canada has announced it plans to cut all of its passenger service in rural Manitoba and northwestern Ontario Oct. 2 if it doesn’t receive millions of dollars in subsidies to keep operating money-losing routes. However, the […] Read more
Ns and the eras of history
I see that yesterday I refered to Lehman Bros as “Lehmann” Bros. Two “N”s rather than one. It could simply be a sloppy error. Or it could be a product of the deep tides moving in the core of my psyche, pushing me to think of a truly two-“N”ed person: David Reimann. I choose to […] Read more
Cruelty of the markets
Sometimes the markets can be very cruel. Think back a year ago today, when Lehmann Bros went belly up then sank to sleep with the fishes. That’s when my Dow Jones Industrial Average chart shows a slashing near-vertical line downwards, which flattened, fell, bounced, fell again into March 9, when it hit the near term […] Read more
Sentimental hog markets
There’s been a nice rally in hog futures and analysts are wondering whether it’s a turning of the tide of sentiment away from the incessant negativity that has dragged down hog prices and killed the hoped-for spring and summer rally. Chicago lean hog futures rose from about $52-53/cwt for the October contract in late August to $57 […] Read more
No news bad news?
USDA hasn’t helped crop sellers by finding that everything’s pretty much as everyone’s been expecting. This is the time of year when fears begin lifting from buyers’ minds about the size of the crop, and often the only thing that will give the crop markets a chance to rise is unexpected problems appearing. Those sorts […] Read more
Bucking up
If you’ve been banking on a weakening Canadian dollar to help recover some of the ground we’ve lost in the commodity markets recently, you didn’t get any new support from the Bank of Canada today. Bank boss Mark Carney reiterated his belief that the economy is quickly rebounding from the recession, the private sector has […] Read more
Organic or local?
It’s been a rough time for the organic agriculture industry recently. A major scientific survey study found no credible evidence anywhere that organic food is nutritionally better than regular old conventional food, damaging a key assumption of most people buying organic food; major multinationals like Wal Mart have partnered with large scale, industrial farms to […] Read more
Deregistered grain on most unwanted list
The Canadian Grain Commission thinks prairie farmers are hanging onto too much of the past. And, the commission says, they could start taking big financial hits if they don’t do a better job of ridding their bins of deregistered grain. “We found some (grain varieties delivered to elevators) that were deregistered 15 to 20 years […] Read more
