It’s easy to become narrowly focused and lose sight of the big picture these days. Lock-down fatigue and several years of social distancing protocols have limited our ability to travel and our ability to explore different places, perspectives, and groups of people. If you’ve ever spoken to someone after they’ve returned from a trip to […] Read more
Stories by Katelyn Duncan
Ag needs to understand organic matter and production risk
A research project from Agriculture Financial Services Corporation shows that soil organic matter may be the most important factor for managing crop-insurance-related production risks. The province-wide study was conducted by Serecon Consulting and used field-level soil organic matter mapping from the Food Water Wellness Foundation. While the intent of the study was to better understand […] Read more
Regenerative agriculture seen as a marketing success story
After attending the recent Saskatchewan Soils Conservation Association Soil Health Conference, I was blown away by what appears to be a marketing success story. Regenerative agriculture and soil health in general are attracting interest not only from consumers. This “alternative agriculture” crowd is also drawing interest from producers who are becoming more flexible in how […] Read more
Strategic management can help weather the storm
Most non-farm businesses have a multitude of standard operating procedures. New employees are handed an orientation manual with set vacation days, and management plans execute a strategic direction for the business. The path to further growth is well understood and financial information is reported quarterly, if not monthly to stakeholders. Traditionally, family farms have been […] Read more
We take care of our own, and that means everybody
We take care of our own. Musician Bruce Springsteen even wrote a song about it. Children aren’t born racist. My own experiences growing up support this. During my childhood, my mother worked with Indigenous populations. She would often bring us to summer barbecues with her students. My most vivid early memories of these events are […] Read more
Former academic takes no-nonsense approach to soil
I first met Les Henry in December 2018 at a conference where I unknowingly sat next to him and another gentleman. After listening to their conversation for several minutes I knew I wanted to be friends. I had read the well-known Henry’s Handbook of Soil and Water in university and often heard my dad spouting […] Read more
Food security more complex issue than we often acknowledge
Too often the term global food security is used to justify our existence as farmers. As an industry, we’ve named organizations, government departments and major marketing campaigns based around the term food security. What usually begins as frightening projections on global population growth urges us as farmers to produce more to feed a “growing global […] Read more
There is value in inviting guests along for a ride in the combine
Harvest is an exciting time of year that is often enhanced by enthusiastic guests riding shotgun in the combine. My family’s farm seems to frequently have guests during harvest time due to our close proximity to the city. While at times it seems like a slight inconvenience to arrange for guests to be transported to […] Read more
Canadian federalism and its impact on environmental policy
The topic of climate change has been front and centre as the fall election approaches and Trudeau federalism continues to be a mystery. Federalism, by definition, is the split in power between the central government as a whole and the local provincial governments. This means certain policies are executed at various levels including federal, provincial, […] Read more
Returning to the farm can be exciting but challenging
Editor’s note: We welcome a new columnist to the Western Producer this week. Katelyn Duncan is a younger farmer from the Regina area, farming on a century farm with her family. She is an agrologist, has worked for Saskatchewan Agriculture, headed up Saskatchewan Young Ag Entrepreneurs, been a field agrologist and crop adviser with Western […] Read more
