Some sheep producers were angry about being excluded from Saskatchewan’s recently announced livestock support program, but a senior industry official wasn’t one of them. Gordon Schroeder, executive director of the Saskatchewan Sheep Development Board, said it would be inappropriate for a sector doing so well to take an ad hoc payment. However, that doesn’t mean […] Read more
Karen Briere
Stories by Karen Briere
Sask. budget brings good news for rural landowners
Most Saskatchewan landowners will pay less education tax this year as the provincial government makes good on its 2007 election promise to pay a greater share. Saskatchewan joins seven other provinces in moving to provincially set education mill rates for each property class — residential, agricultural and commercial. Finance minister Rod Gantefoer announced in the […] Read more
Sask. doubles funding for livestock drought water program
A water development program implemented in southwestern Saskatchewan last year proved so popular that its funding has been nearly doubled. The federal and provincial governments have kicked in an additional $8.8 million and $5.2 million, respectively, to add $14 million to the Farm and Ranch Infrastructure Water Program. The original funding was $15 million. Saskatchewan […] Read more
New audit will cost taxpayers: CWB
BALGONIE, Sask. – Bring on the auditor general, says Canadian Wheat Board director Rod Flaman. Responding to federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz’s Feb. 26 call for a full examination of the board’s books by the auditor general in light of significant losses caused by volatile trading last year, Flaman told farmers that an independent consultant, […] Read more
CWB hears criticism on ergot
BALGONIE, Sask. – A farmer from Pilot Butte, Sask., says the Canadian Wheat Board should have done more to help producers with ergot problems. The disease hit wheat crops hard last year, and Frank Szeles said he would have liked a little more help. He told a meeting held by his wheat board director, Rod […] Read more
Lamb demand up, supply down
MOOSE JAW, Sask. – Canadian demand for lamb is increasing at the same rate that domestic production is declining, leaving the industry in a quandary. Jennifer Fleming-MacTavish, executive director of the Canadian Sheep Federation, told a producer workshop in Moose Jaw that the ewe inventory has shrunk by more than 100,000 head in the last […] Read more
Lamb considered special occasion meat
MOOSE JAW, Sask. – Consumers who stop at the grocery store in search of supper aren’t likely to pick up lamb. “Lamb is not seen as an everyday meal,” Martin Gooch, director of the George Morris Centre’s value chain management centre in Guelph, Ont., told a recent workshop. However, his study of consumer buying habits […] Read more
Sask. gov’t selling meat plant
The government-owned meat processing plant in Melfort, Sask., is for sale. Thomson Meats Ltd. produces value-added products under its own brand and is also the home of the Saskatchewan Toll Processing Centre. The centre was part of the province’s meat strategy in the wake of BSE. The facility was designed in anticipation of greater domestic […] Read more
Livestock plan strains fed-prov relations
Saskatchewan’s decision to support its livestock producers has strained a cordial relationship with Ottawa. The province announced $71 million for cattle and hog producers Feb. 26, saying the money is its 40 percent share of a traditional cost-shared program and Ottawa should provide its 60 percent or other meaningful support. “We are tired of the […] Read more
Sask. rural projects approved
The first-round of recipients of government money from the Building Canada fund were announced in Regina recently. Forty-six infrastructure projects worth $95 million can go ahead. The projects include bridges, roads, and water and sewer upgrades and construction. The federal, provincial and municipal governments will split the costs equally. David Marit, president of the Saskatchewan […] Read more
