McDONALD’S STEPS UP ANTi-SOciAL MEDiA

McDONALD’S
STEPS UP
Anti-social
media
Beef and forage
research funded » PG 9
Pork council receives
death threats » PG 38
SERVING MANITOBA FARMERS SINCE 1925 | Vol. 74, No. 6 | $1.75
February 11, 2016
Canadian
pasta makers
accuse Turkey
of dumping
manitobacooperator.ca
Farming for profit
To add insult to injury,
much of the offending
product is made with
Canadian durum
BY ALLAN DAWSON
Co-operator staff
T
urkey is buying Canadian
durum, using subsidies
to make it into pasta
and dumping it back into
Canada, the Canadian Pasta
Manufacturers say.
Pasta imports from Turkey
more than doubled in 2015
compared to 2014, while its value tripled, Don Jarvis, president
of the Canadian Pasta Manufacturers Association (CPMA), said
in an interview from his Ottawa
office Feb. 2.
“They (Turkey) are buying
Canadian durum, shipping it
all the way over there, making it
into pasta and shipping it back,
according to some of my members, cheaper than what they
paid for the semolina (milled
durum) here in Canada,” Jarvis
said. “You’re shipping this wonderful durum across the ocean
and it comes back as the finished product cheaper than you
can make it in Canada. That’s
the problem.”
The CPMA will seek countervailing duties on Turkish pasta if
Canadian firms don’t voluntarily
stop importing it, Jarvis said.
See TURKEY on page 6 »
Organic potatoes are a tough row to hoe (see page 33) but the managers of Poplar Grove Farm say the crop is worth it. photo: Cam Dueck
More farmers looking
at organic potential
2015 saw more producers start transition process
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON
Co-operator staff
Publication Mail Agreement 40069240
H
igh prices and the
prospect of fewer input
costs are attracting
more farmers to organic farming in Manitoba.
At least 30 farmers began a
transition in 2015, convinced
they can become more profitable using a farming system
that also costs less to operate,
says provincial organic specialist Laura Telford.
T h e y a re c o n v e n t i o n a l
farmers who’ve crunched the
numbers and are seeing a
business case to convert, she
said.
Judging by the crowd at an
Ag Days seminar devoted to
organic production, it appears
there’s more thinking about it.
“A lot of people are looking
at our cost of production with
interest and the fact you can
be quite profitable in organic
agriculture,” said Telford.
It’s a marked contrast to
years gone by when a couple
dozen farmers already organically farming attended.
About 140 were at last
month’s meeting listening to
presentations about the transition process, other farmers’
management practices, and
how farming this way can be
good for the bottom line.
Manitoba Agriculture crop
production budget expert Roy
Arnott told the seminar that
based on expected costs and
returns for crops this year,
organic producers could see
net profit levels range from
$100 to $300 per acre.
That compares with conventionally produced crops,
whose net profits range
between $10 to $50 per acre,
he said.
Those numbers may not
be coming as a surprise,
said Telford. “People have
been hearing about this for a
while,” she said.
“Sometimes it takes extra
low prices on the conventional side to make them
notice those high organic
prices,” she said.
Making the move to an
organic system is neither simple nor quick, however, as
panellists attested.
“It’s kind of no man’s land
when you’re comfor table
with a conventional system
and you’re trying to anticipate how you’ll go through a
few years of a learning curve
See ORGANIC on page 7 »
Cage free: Canadian egg farmers enter new era » PAGE 40
2
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
INSIDE
Did you know?
LIVESTOCK
A cheese wheel
backs up this deal
Enriching
environment
The pork industry
is adapting to a new
standard for animal care
12
An Italian company is selling bonds based on Parmesan
Reuters
A
CROPS
In the drone zone
Potato farmers are
encouraged to think
small when they first
tackle the skies
17
FEATURE
Making it work
Two farmers talk
about their organic
experience
33
CROSSROADS
It’s all about
relationships
A new organization
for small farmers is
hoping to grow
4
5
8
10
Editorials
Comments
What’s Up
Livestock Markets
n It a l i a n d a i r y c o o p e ra t i v e h a s s o l d
bonds backed by
Parmesan cheese, the company said, a rare example of
one of the country’s plethora of small firms raising
funding on capital markets.
Three years of recession
have choked bank lending
and Prime Minister Matteo
Renzi’s government is trying to encourage firms to
raise money elsewhere and
take advantage of a tentative economic recovery.
Cheese maker 4 Madonne
Caseificio dell’Emilia has
done just that, raising six
million euros ($6.55 million) in mini-bonds guaranteed by wheels of
Parmesan.
4 Madonne’s chair man
said it would use the money
raised in the bond issue to
improve its facilities and
promote the thick-rinded
cheese it makes in Italy’s
northern gastronomic
heartland Emilia Romagna.
A worker opens a Parmesan cheese wheel at a warehouse owned by Credito
Emiliano bank in Montecavolo, near Reggio Emila, central Italy. photo: REUTERS/Stefano Rellandini
More than 95 per cent
of Italian companies have
fewer than 10 employees
and traditionally rely on
bank lending for financing.
But banks’ willingness to
provide credit has eroded
as bad loans piled up on
their balance sheets during the recession, making
it harder for smaller, more
vulnerable companies to
get funding.
The government wants to
spur lending to boost the
e c o n o m y, w h i c h i s e s t i mated to have grown about
0.8 per cent last year.
4 Madonne’s bonds will
pay a fixed yield of five per
cent each year until they
mature in January 2022.
READER’S PHOTO
44
Grain Markets
Weather Vane
Classifieds
Sudoku
11
16
27
30
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3
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Pictures help avoid confusion in the barn
Hiring employees from diverse cultural backgrounds has rewards and challenges
BY SHANNON VANRAES
Co-operator staff
C
ommunicating well with
employees can be challenging at the best of
times, but throw additional languages and new customs into
the mix, and it can be a minefield for the unprepared.
“I think we’ve become way
too politically correct in this
country and we need to call
a spade a spade… because it
would really help us to understand people a lot better,” said
Tina Varughese, who specializes
in cross-cultural communications and spoke at the annual
Manitoba Swine Seminar in
Winnipeg last week.
“When we know better, we
do better,” she said, noting
that businesses often reject
potential employees based on
misinterpretations of cultural
customs. For example, someone interviewing an indigenous
person might be put off if they
don’t maintain eye contact. The
reality is that people from some
cultures, including some indigenous cultures, avert their gaze
out of respect for the person
they are speaking to, Varughese
said.
“So if you misread these
signals, you might be ruling out the best person for the
job before they even have a
chance,” she said.
As the pork industry continues to ease labour short-
“And you do not want
to be the person who
just accidentally
flipped the new
employees the bird.”
Tina Varughese
ages with foreign workers and
new arrivals, learning how to
navigate cultural differences
is absolutely crucial, said
Varughese, who was born to
parents of East Indian origin in
Saskatchewan. Even common
Canadian hand signals — like
the thumbs-up sign — can have
hugely different and offensive
meanings to people from other
cultural backgrounds.
“And you do not want to be
the person who just accidentally flipped the new employees
the bird,” Varughese said.
But nowhere is good communication more important than
when it comes to safety, especially when working around
livestock and machinery.
“I think when you are working with people who don’t have
English as a first language, it’s
really key to use pictorials,
pictures, and all techniques
of communication,” she said.
“That means audio, visual,
and kinaesthetic. Audio, you’re
going to speak the message,
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Tina Varughese Photo: Shannon VanRaes
visual, you will use pictures,
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it takes, video and kinaesthetic
means you’re going to use
examples of anecdotes, or stories to get that message across.”
I t ’s a l s o i m p o r t a n t t o
understand if your employees are direct or indirect
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While Canadians tend to
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Filipinos are usually indirect
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“So they don’t tend to say they
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An open-ended question
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At one time learning about
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were inclined to, she said.
“For business today, it’s a
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4
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
OPINION/EDITORIAL
Ideology and modern
farming
W
henever the subject of organic
agriculture surfaces in a discussion about modern farming, the “yabuts” start flowing fast and
sometimes, furiously.
Ya but organic farmers don’t produce
as much as “conventional‚” farmers do,
so if everyone went organic, there would
be shortages, more pressure on land
and higher food prices. And so it goes.
Laura Rance
Those “yabuts‚”are rooted in a certain
Editor
ideology about agriculture that is deeply
entrenched in practice, policy and even
our language — a view that organic agriculture is an outdated
and inefficient farming system that romanticizes the good old
days.
John P. Reganold and Jonathon M. Wachter, authors of a
newly released report from the University of Washington, trace
it back to former U.S. agriculture secretary Earl Butz — the
same guy who encouraged farmers in the early 1970s to grow
fencerow to fencerow.
“Before we go back to organic agriculture in this country,
somebody must decide which 50 million Americans we are
going to let starve or go hungry, “Butz reportedly said in 1971.
This latest study, “Organic Agriculture in the 21st Century,”
appears in the February issue of the journal Nature Plants.
Reganold, a University of Washington professor of soil science
and agro-ecology, and doctoral candidate Jonathan Wachter,
analyzed 40 years of science comparing organic and conventional agriculture against four metrics of sustainability as
identified by the National Academy of Sciences: productivity,
economics, environment, and community well-being.
Organic production systems compare favourably on three
out of the four.
The analysis challenges conventional thinking in the ongoing debate over how agriculture can best meet the needs of the
world’s growing population without destroying the planet.
It’s not ideological to say that organic farming systems
yield fewer bushels per acre. That’s a fact. The Washington
University report found organic farming systems yield on
average eight to 25 per cent less than chemically based
systems. But it is a fact of diminishing significance as that
gap closes thanks to better seed, growing conditions and
management.
The ideology lies in the assumptions that the pursuit of
high-yield agriculture will “feed the world” and that it will
reduce the pressure on the world’s remaining undeveloped
lands. In reality, that pressure continues at a relentless pace
through high prices and low.
There is also a certain ideology in the language describing conventional farming as “modern” and organic as about
“going back.” While organic production systems don’t use the
chemical production aids developed over the past 50 years or
so, today’s organic farmers know far more about managing
biological systems than their grandparents did.
There are environmental costs to crop inputs such as nitrogen that aren’t fully accounted for in the price of food. Cashstrapped governments looking for ways to mitigate and adapt
to climate change are starting to notice.
The research into organic and perennial cropping systems
could provide answers to conventional farmers too. The evidence shows the organic model delivers healthier soil with
better water-holding capacity, uses less energy, and emits
fewer greenhouse gases. The study cites “some evidence” it
produces more nutritious food too, although that remains
hotly debated.
As for the argument,“ya but organic foods cost more,” that’s
absolutely true. Where it gets ideological is debating whether
that’s a good or bad thing.
Consumers vote with their dollars. The WSU study noted
sales of organic foods and beverages increased fivefold to
US$72 billion between 1999 and 2013 and they are expected to
double again by 2018. Demand continues to grow faster than
the available supply.
The fact that there is a growing subset of the consuming
public that is willing to pay more to eat should be celebrated
in agriculture, not scorned.
That’s not to say organic is for everyone. Nor should this editorial be misconstrued as promoting this system over others.
There are barriers to entry into organic farming, beginning
with the three years of transition before a person can collect
those premiums. It requires a different mindset and is more
labour intensive. Existing farm policy tends to support the status quo.
But as a business proposition, it’s a legitimate one, especially in an era when society is looking for agriculture to be
part of a sustainable solution, instead of being part of the
problem.
Farm organizations have been lobbying governments for
more than a decade for policies that reward farmers for delivering environmental goods and services. Organic farmers are
already being rewarded — through the marketplace.
[email protected]
There’s no such thing as a free lunch
— or free trade
BY ALAN GUEBERT
W
e in U.S. agriculture talk about free
trade agreements as if they are the
international equivalent of a free lunch.
This lovely belief, of course, overlooks the
absolute certainty that there is no such thing as a
free lunch. Someone somewhere always pays.
More often than not, that someone over the
last 25 years has been the U.S. and its farmers, claims new research from the Agricultural
Policy Analysis Center (APAC) at the University of
Tennessee.
In the lead-up to the Obama administration bringing the Trans-Pacific Partnership to
Congress, APAC’s Daryll E. Ray and Harwood D.
Schaffer penned a series of columns that examined the effects of seven recent American “free”
trade deals on U.S. farm and food exports and
imports.
For example, when Ray and Schaffer squared
the books on ag trade with Canada under the
North American Free Trade Agreement, they
found that the “cumulative balance of trade” for
the U.S. goods from 1997 to 2014 “was -$30.4
billion.”
That means Canada sent $30.4 billion more
in ag goods — grains, meat, animals, fish, wood,
and fur — south than America sent north
under NAFTA once the 1994 deal was fully
implemented.
Likewise, Mexico sold the U.S. $9.6 billion
more in food and farm goods over the same
18-year period than the U.S. sold Mexico.
In total, they noted, NAFTA brought nearly $40
billion more Canadian and Mexican farm and
food goods into the U.S. between 1997 and 2014
than the U.S. shipped to Canada and Mexico.
This isn’t breaking news; anyone who can read
knows that NAFTA has been far more beneficial
to international agbiz that works both sides of the
OUR HISTORY:
O
border than farmers and ranchers who work on
either side. What continues to be news, however,
is that American farm and commodity groups
stubbornly refuse to accept that NAFTA — like all
trade deals — is a two-way street.
“As the NAFTA results suggest, high expectations that trade deals will accelerate growth in
the value of total U.S. agricultural exports don’t
always materialize,” Ray and Shaffer wrote.
When they examined other trade pacts since
NAFTA, they found that any expectations, high,
low or in between, almost never materialize.
For example, overall the 2001 U.S.-Jordan
pact is $224 million under water, the 2004 U.S.Australia deal has netted U.S. farmers a piddling
$175 million over 10 years, and the 2006 trade
pacts with Bahrain and Morocco collectively are
about $90 million in the hole.
The big loser, though, is the 2004 U.S.-Chile
pact. In 10 years, Chile has sent the U.S. $24.7 billion in farm goods more than the U.S. sent there.
Overall, these post-NAFTA trade deals have,
cumulatively, brought $1.6 billion more of
imported food and farm goods here than we
exported there.
“While that number is relatively small,” suggest the Tennessee co-authors, “it is likely not
the size or direction of the net change that trade
agreement proponents would have had farmers
believe at the time these agreements were put
into place.”
Shorn of its academic niceties, what they mean
is that American farmers and ranchers resemble
sheep running toward often-promised greener
pastures every time politicians and farm leaders
ring the free trade bell. Those greener pastures,
like the proverbial free lunch, however, rarely
“materialize.”
Alan Guebert is a syndicated columnist from Delavan,
Illinois. His Farm and Food File is published weekly
through the U.S. and Canada. farmandfoodfile.com.
February 1987
ur February 1987 issues had several ads for Vitavax, but it and
its manufacturer Uniroyal are now part of history. Vitavax was
based on lindane, of which use was discontinued in Canada in
2004 except for the treatment of head lice.
Our Feb. 5 issue reported that as a result of the continuing world grain
trade war, the wheat board reported a $201-million deficit in the 198586 pool accounts. It was the largest-ever deficit, totalling more than all
deficits combined on the previous 45 years. There was little outlook for
improvement, and the annual Manitoba Outlook Conference heard a
provincial statistician forecast a 21 per cent drop in farm income for the
coming year.
Land rents were dropping accordingly — prices around Brandon were
quoted as $18-$22 per acre versus $27-$32 in 1986, and provincial officials suggested a 22.5 per cent share for crop-share landlords.
On Feb. 12 we reported that the RCMP were reviewing 33 cases of
major contract violations under the stabilization plan operated by the
Manitoba Beef Commission. The farmers were suspected of taking
advantages of the current higher prices without having paid the premiums. At a meeting in Gladstone, beef producers heard that the commission had to cut support levels the
previous year because of reduced revenue from farmers who had cut their coverage levels due to rising
prices. Commission chair Rudy Usick said the province had contributed $52 million since 1982, and at one
point the plan’s deficit had reached $33 million.
5
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COMMENT/FEEDBACK
Cauliflower hysteria offers lessons
for Canadian consumers
Food inflation is hammering consumers, but there are ways to reduce price pressure
BY SYLVAIN CHARLEBOIS
Guelph/Troy Media
F
ood inflation is top of mind
for Canadian consumers, with
rampant claims about produce
being grossly overpriced.
And the latest consumer price
index (CPI) repor t won’t calm
Canadian shoppers any time soon,
since food inflation stands at 4.1 per
cent.
That’s a significant contrast to
the -0.4 per cent in food inflation
reported in the U.S. just a few days
ago. With global food prices dropping
to record lows, the Canadian economy over the past few months is an
industrialized world anomaly.
Food inflation remains substantially higher than our overall inflation rate, forcing many consumers to
make budgetary compromises to pay
grocery bills.
The dollar is obviously a major
piece of the story, but it is just one
piece.
Climate change, and in particular
droughts in some parts of California,
has given Canadian importers grief.
California’s close proximity cuts shipping costs, while offering higher
levels of freshness and quality, for
imported products. Canada imports
billions in agricultural goods every
year from the Golden State. However,
farm gate price fluctuations have
been unpredictable. Cauliflower
prices have swung from $35 for
a case of 12 to as high as $100 last
November.
If products are unavailable in
California or are too expensive,
importers need to procure them elsewhere, even as far away as Europe. As
a result, costs increase — for example,
shipping costs can easily triple. Over
the next few months, lettuce, strawberries, grapes, oranges, celery and,
of course, cauliflower will likely be
affected by broader influences. These
items will all likely cost more — if
they can be found at all.
In fact, Canadians should expect
more shortages on the retail shelves
over the next few weeks, and not
because of limited supplies or diminished access. The recent cauliflower
woes provide a lesson to Canadian
food retailers on market-based hysteria. The food market has become
increasingly fickle, financially capricious and hypersensitive to price
fluctuations.
After a few weeks of shocking cauliflower prices, the story got major
traction and that pushed consumers
away. So cauliflower prices dropped
dramatically, to $2.50 a head and, in
some parts of the country, to as low as
$1 a head. At such prices, most retailers are likely selling cauliflower at a
loss.
The dramatic shift was essentially
created by retailers’ fears of being
saddled with excess inventories.
Perishables must constantly move
through the supply chain to reduce
losses.
Importers and retailers know what
the market can bear. A lower dollar
and procurement challenges will most
certainly push prices up in our market.
For Canadian grocers, recent cauliflower woes should serve as a cautionary tale on buyers’
hypersensitivity to price. photo: thinkstock
Given what happened to cauliflower,
most retailers will think twice before
importing a product that requires a
much higher price to bring a decent
profit. If retail prices are considered
too high, importers may turn away
from a product, creating shortages on
supermarket shelves. So until things
calm down, we shouldn’t be surprised
to see retailers being more careful with
their purchasing practices.
In the meantime, slumping oil
prices may offer the silver lining
Canadians need to cope with higher
grocery bills. Families with at least
one car can save $1,000 to $1,500 a
year on gas, based on current low
prices. Since inflated food prices will
cost the average family $345 more
over the same period, lower pump
prices will definitely help — particularly in an economy in which wages
are barely budging.
If that’s not enough, getting more
acquainted with grocery stores’ freezers can help consumers get the nutrients they need until spring arrives.
And then we can look to Canadian
farmers to bring more freshness to
our kitchen tables.
Sylvain Charlebois is a professor at the Food
Institute at the University of Guelph. © 2016,
distributed by Troy Media.
Farm income recipe: Crash and burn. Recover. Repeat
Two longtime ag economists argue that in agriculture, what goes around always comes around
BY HARWOOD D. SCHAFFER
AND DARYLL E. RAY
W
hen we began writing this column more
than 15 years and over
800 columns ago, we laid out
some of our basic principles and
understandings of the nature of
agricultural production. At that
time, U.S. agricultural policy had
just moved away from programs
designed to support crop prices.
Subsequently, they fell well
below the cost of production
and farmers depended upon
Loan Deficiency Payments and
emergency payments. The anticipated boom in corn exports
to China had not materialized;
China was still exporting corn.
For some major agricultural
states, direct government payments were over 150 per cent of
net farm income and crop farmers were desperately looking
for ways to add value. We saw
corn being used to make clothing fibres and soybean oil being
used to make printing ink and
provide dust suppression on
roads. Some farmers were shifting to feeding corn to hogs.
But the holy grail of the valueadded movement was ethanol
as a fuel additive, and the protein that remained could be
used as feed for cattle. Ethanol
could replace tetra-ethyl lead
to increase octane, and when
mixed with gasoline would
result in cleaner-burning
engines.
With the price of corn below
$2 a bushel, farmers began to
lobby their state legislators
to institute a 10 per cent ethanol mandate. At the same time
farmers’ meetings were set up
to raise the money needed to
build and operate corn-ethanol
plants. Proponents told farmers
that these plants would allow
them to capture added value for
their corn as well as a share of
the ethanol profits.
We saw farmers put money
down in multiples of $1,000
for the right to sell a bushel of
corn at a two- to five-cent premium over local elevator prices
for every dollar they invested in
the plant, as well as to receive
unspecified future profits. This
was at a time when corn farmers were losing much more than
that on each bushel. They were
desperate.
MTBE, a competing fuel oxygenate, was determined to be
a carcinogen, and the renew-
able fuels standard was set by
Congress. A period of high gas
prices made ethanol plants
extremely profitable and a flood
of money from beyond the farm
sector was invested in ethanol
plants, increasing the domestic
demand for corn by half.
The soy boom
Even though China has not
imported significant amounts
of corn, it has become a
major importer of soybeans,
making soybean production
quite profitable. In the last
half of the last decade we saw
most crop prices soar as the
demand for corn by ethanol
plants increased from less
than a billion bushels a year
to over five billion — farmers
increased planted acreage to
meet the growing demand.
With profitable prices for both
corn and soybeans, many land
grant agricultural economists
began to posit that corn had hit
a new plateau of $4 and above,
just as it had done in the mid’70s when the price plateaued
above $2 a bushel.
On the farm policy front, we
saw crop revenue insurance
become the major element of
safety net programs accompa-
nied by direct payments. Little
attention was paid to safety
net programs as conventional
wisdom held that crops would
remain profitable for as far as the
eye could see. In the latest Farm
Bill, direct payments were given
up as politically untenable when
farmers were making record
profits.
All the while, we pointed out
the upside-down nature of crop
revenue insurance programs
and the lack of a true safety
net. We argued for policies that
would provide a safety net by
sequestering a small portion of
storable commodities from the
market, providing a reserve that
could be used in the case of a
significant production shortfall. We also urged farmers to
make the choice between a program based on locking in protection from unthinkably low
crop prices rather than another
achieving potential payment
maximization if prices were to
fall only a little.
Many of our colleagues, farm
and commodity organization
leaders, and legislators suggested that we needed to get
with the program. Our policy
conclusions were passé and
agriculture was entering a new
era, we were told. We were even
accused of “purposefully taking the ‘other’ (or the ‘opposite’)
side of many policy issues.” In
reality, from Day 1 our analytical approach and the resulting
policy implications have been
grounded in a pragmatic understanding of the forces in agriculture — economic and non-economic — that are long-standing
and continue to be powerfully
pervasive.
In the coming articles, we
will lay out the social and economic model we have used and
will continue to use in our writing of this weekly column. We
believe that the recent plunge in
prices — following the politically
driven demand expansion that
caused the multi-year surge in
crop prices — confirms that the
model is as relevant today as it
was in the 1933-95 era when this
model was the dominant justification for even having farm
programs.
Harwood D. Schaffer is a research
assistant professor in the Agricultural
Policy Analysis Center, Institute of
Agriculture, University of Tennessee.
Daryll E. Ray is emeritus professor and
is the former director of the centre
(APAC). www.agpolicy.org.
6
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
FROM PAGE ONE
TURKEY Continued from page 1
“We are already doing preliminary
research as a prelude with going forward with a substantial case,” he said,
noting the first step is getting the
message out to Canadian importers.
“If one large retailer determines
they want to stock a lot of this, another one will do it to be price competitive and then pretty soon the
domestic industry could be in serious trouble. That’s why we’re trying
to reach out and communicate that
we see a problem. We’d rather not
proceed with a time-consuming and
costly case.”
Under domestic and international
law Canadian pasta makers are allowed to seek countervailing duties
on imported pasta to even the playing field. However, before duties are
applied it must be proven the offending imports are subsidized and/or
dumped (sold in Canada below the
selling price in Turkey) and injuring
Canadian pasta makers. That process
takes at least seven months, is costly
and the duties, which go to the Canadian government, not pasta makers,
aren’t retroactive. (See sidebar.)
During the first 11 months of 2015,
Canada imported 5.25 million kilograms of Turkish pasta, up from two
million in 2014, Jarvis said.
“The value has gone from just under $2 million to $5.5 million for an
11-month period,” he said “With another month it will be around $6 million. It will have tripled (in value).”
The average landed price of Turkish pasta in Canada last year was $1
per kilogram versus $1.5 and $2.20
for pasta from the United States and
Italy, respectively.
Turkey is now Canada’s third-largest export pasta supplier after the
United States and Italy, Jarvis said.
The United States slapped countervailing duties on imported Turkish
pasta years ago and recently renewed
them, Jarvis said.
Canada is the world’s largest durum wheat exporter, averaging 3.8
million tonnes a year based on average production of 5.3 million tonnes.
Canada exports 80 per cent of its durum turning a little less than one million tonnes annually into pasta.
Four companies produce almost all
of Canada’s pasta: Italpasta, Brampton, Ont., Primo, North York, Ont.,
Catelli, Montreal, Que., and Grisspasta, Longueuil, Que. Sales total $300
million to $400 million a year.
The countervailing
duty process
explained
BY ALLAN DAWSON
Co-operator staff
file photo
“There are jobs and investment
here,” Jarvis said.
The alleged dumping is also a concern to Canadian durum millers who
produce the semolina (durum flour)
Canadian pasta makers use, said
Gord Harrison, president of the Canadian National Millers Association.
“Canadian market demand for
durum semolina and flour has been
steady in recent years but still below
long-term average, as is the case for
other milled wheat products,” he
said in an email. “Canada’s durum
millers are highly dependent upon
the Canadian market. In this context, the surge in imports of pasta is
of concern.”
Canadian durum exports to Turkey
rose to 105,800 tonnes in 2013-14,
versus 82,700 the previous crop year,
according to Canadian Grain Commission figures.
“Given Canada’s market share in
Turkey, I suspect some of that pasta
coming to Canada was made with
Canadian durum,” said Cereals Canada president Cam Dahl.
While durum exports to Turkey are
important, so are sales to Canadian
millers, he added.
“It’s in Canada’s interest, and all
of the value chain’s interest, to have
that processing in Canada so it is a
concern when subsidies from other
governments threaten that industry,”
he said. “Yes, we might be export-
“They (Turkey) are
buying Canadian durum,
shipping it all the way
over there, making it
into pasta and shipping it
back, according to some
of my members, cheaper
than what they paid for
the semolina (milled
durum) here in Canada.”
Don Jarvis
ing some of that durum to Turkey to
come back as pasta… but if it’s based
on government support then what
happens when that government support disappears and we’re left without the export opportunity and the
value added here in Canada?
“I am always concerned when foreign subsidies are putting Canadian
processing at risk as opposed to genuine market conditions.”
Dahl doubts asking companies to
voluntarily stop importing Turkish
pasta will work.
“I don’t know of the approach having worked in the past anywhere, put
that way.”
Getting countervailing duties applied to imports believed
to be subsidized and/or dumped is a two-pronged process
that takes at least seven months.
It starts by the industry being hurt filing a complaint
with the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA), the
agency’s website says.
The application, must represent at least 25 per cent
of the Canadian producers affected by the imports and
include evidence that the imports are dumped or subsidized.
Dumping occurs when goods exported to Canada are
sold at prices lower than in the exporting country or sold
at unprofitable prices.
“Subsidizing occurs when goods imported into Canada
benefit from foreign government financial assistance,” the
site says. “The amount of subsidizing on imported goods
may be offset by the application of countervailing duty.”
Examples of subsidies include loans at preferential
rates, grants and tax incentives.
In a separate and independent process the Canadian
International Trade Tribunal (CITT) investigates whether
alleged dumping of imports are “injuring” or are “threatening to cause injury” to Canadian producers through
“reduced prices, lost sales, lost market share, decreased
profits and other such difficulties.”
If the CBSA determines there should be an investigation, questionnaires will be sent to exporters, importers
and, in subsidy investigations, to the foreign government
involved. If necessary CBSA will meet directly with parties
to verify the information provided.
To determine if imports are injuring domestic producers, CITT holds public hearings where interested parties,
including Canadian producers, importers and foreign
exporters, are allowed to present their arguments and
question witnesses.
Although separate, CITT and CBSA’s investigations,
occur at the same time.
CBSA can impose a provisional duty on imports of
dumped or subsidized goods following a preliminary decision of injury by CITT.
CBSA’s preliminary decision of dumping or subsidizing
is normally made within three months of the start of the
investigation. This temporary duty is intended to protect
Canadian producers until CITT makes its final injury decision.
If CITT issues a final injury decision, CBSA imposes antidumping or countervailing duties on all imports that are
dumped or subsidized for at least five years.
[email protected]
FARMLAND FOR SALE
Offers to Purchase shall be entertained by the Public Guardian and Trustee of Manitoba on behalf
of the Vendor for property located in the R. M. of Gilbert Plains and legally described as:
Property 1: NE 20-27-21 WPM 146.85 total acres. Cultivated acreage on two separate fields
suitable for grain production totaling 70 cultivated acres divided by Highway #10. Property has
further potential for livestock/pasture development and 15 acre hay field. Balance is undeveloped
land. Property includes older house (poor condition) and yard site, together with several wooden
and three galvanized steel grain bins. Yard site has Hydro service and well.
Property 2: NW 21-27-21 WPM 146.92 total acres. Consists of 16 cultivated acres with the balance
undeveloped land.
Interested parties are asked to submit Offers to Purchase with respect to the property no later
than 12:00 noon, March 4, 2016, to:
Attention: Jana Taylor, Barrister and Solicitor
Confidential – Tender
Suite 500, 155 Carlton Street
Winnipeg MB R3C 5R9
Phone: (204) 945-2709
In submitting any Offer, any interested parties shall rely upon their own inspection of the property.
The Vendor is not obligated to accept the highest or any Offer submitted.
7
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
ORGANIC Continued from page 1
to get to the other side,” said
Darcy Hickson, who switched
to organic farming in 1999. He
and his son Donovan now farm
together on 1,000 acres and
also raise organic cattle.
Brandon-area organic farmer
Ian Grossart described the
struggles he had trying to start
the transition to organic in
the late 1990s with a field of
echinacea. It was a crop they
weren’t familiar with and was a
mess of weeds, he said.
“I probably convinced some
conventional neighbours to
never go organic,” he joked.
But the Grossarts persevered,
and today grow a range of
organic crops on a farm where
they also raise grass-fed beef.
Organic farming is “a steep
learning curve,” but fortunately there are more resources
now available to help farmers
decide if it’s the right direction
to take, said Telford.
“We’ve learned a lot in the
last decade with respect to
weed management, designing
good crop rotations,” she said.
A new publication Organic
Fi e l d C ro p Ha n d b o o k h a s
recently been published and
is available through Canadian
Organic Growers online.
Farmers will have another
chance to network with organic
buyers, and to learn more
about the skills required for
managing an organic production system later this month.
The two-day Prairie
Organics: Think Whole Farm
“A lot of people are
looking at our cost
of production with
interest and the fact
you can be quite
profitable in organic
agriculture.”
Laura Telford
MAFRD organic specialist
Feb. 18 and 19 will provide
existing organic producers with
more information to build their
production and marketing
skills and help them connect
to potential buyers who will be
present at the show for one-onone meetings.
Breakout sessions for grain
and livestock producers are
targeted at those now farming
organically. A separate stream
for vegetable production will
provide more information to
existing conventional vegetable
producers who may be considering transitioning a few acres
to organic.
There are fewer than 150
organic farmers in Manitoba.
The majority is strictly field
crop producers (120), plus 27
crop and livestock producers.
Only five farms currently
grow organic vegetables for
retail or wholesale markets.
There are other smaller-scale
g rowe r s s e l l i n g c o n s u m e r
direct.
Study defines role of organic
ag in feeding the world
Numerous studies point to the environmental benefits
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON
Co-operator staff
O
rganic agriculture can play an important
role in feeding the world, according to a
new study comparing conventional and
organic farming systems’ ability to produce
yields, benefit farmers’ bottom line, and sustain the environment.
That’s the conclusion drawn by Washington
State University ( WSU) researchers after
a review of 40 years of science-based evidence comparing organic and conventional
agriculture.
“Hundreds of scientific studies now show
that organic ag should play a role in feeding
the world” said John Reganold, WSU professor
of soil science and agro-ecology, lead author of
Organic Agriculture in the 21st Century.
The evidence is mounting that organic farming has this legitimate role, he asserts.
“Thirty years ago, there were just a couple of
handfuls of studies comparing organic agriculture with conventional,” he said in a release.
“In the last 15 years, these kinds of studies have
skyrocketed.”
Their analysis of the two systems show
organic, as a system of farming not reliant
on synthetic fertilizers and pesticides while
boosting soil quality and lowering greenhouse
gas emissions has capacity to sustain both
farmers and a healthy environment for food
production.
The review also describes cases where
organic yields can be higher than conventional
farming methods, which squares off with the
main criticism of organic farming as an inefficient farm system because it requires more
land to yield the same amount of food.
“In severe drought conditions, which are
expected to increase with climate change,
organic farms have the potential to produce
high yields because of the higher water-holding
capacity of organically farmed soils,” Reganold.
Feeding the world is not only a matter of
yield but reducing food waste and improving
distribution systems, he said.
“If you look at calorie production per capita
we’re producing more than enough food for
seven billion people now, but we waste 30 to
40 per cent of it,” Reganold said. “It’s not just a
matter of producing enough, but making agriculture environmentally friendly and making
sure that food gets to those who need it.”
Reganold and fellow study author Jonathan
Wachter conclude that no single type of farming will feed the world, but rather a balance of
systems including ‘a blend of organic and other
innovative farming systems, including agroforestry, integrated farming, conservation agriculture, mixed crop/livestock and still undiscovered systems.’
Organic Farming in the 21st Century is the
cover story for this month’s issue of the journal
Nature Plants.
[email protected]
[email protected]
HOW CUSTOMERS USE CANADIAN FIELD CROPS
Think durum
wheat.
Think delicious
bread.
Flour from high protein Canada Western Amber Durum
wheat is exceptional to work with in the production
of hearth-style, artisan and flat breads. Durum wheat
has been used in bread making in many countries for
centuries, including Italy, North Africa and the Middle
East. Canadian durum is known for its exceptional
brightness and it gives a very pleasing yellow colour
to the end product, something many consumers find
appealing.
cigi.ca
Canadian International Grains Institute
8
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Former executive director for
Canadian Foodgrains Bank passes
Loewen travelled across the country promoting the concept with Canadian farmers
Canadian Foodgrains Bank
release
W
Bert Loewen was the first executive director of
the CFGB. Photo: Christian Week
ilbert Loewen, the first executive director of Canadian
Foodgrains Bank (CFGB),
passed away February 2. He was 93.
Loewen played a vital role in the
establishment of the CFGB. After a
full career in the Manitoba school
system, he was asked in 1979 to
head up the recently established
Mennonite Central Committee Food
Bank, which was facilitating the
donation of grain by farmers to be
sent overseas.
He travelled across the country
growing support from Canadian farmers, and soon negotiated an agreement with the Canadian Wheat Board,
which helped expand the program.
The Canadian Foodgrains Bank was
established as a separate organization in 1983 to facilitate the participation of other churches and church
agencies in the program. Loewen was
asked to serve as the first executive
director, and served in this capacity
until 1990.
According to those who knew
Loewen during those years, his hard
work, dedication and determination
helped shape the organization into
what it is today.
John Wieler directed international
programming for Mennonite Central
Co m m i t t e e Ca n a d a a t t h e t i m e
Loewen was leading the Mennonite
Central Committee Food Bank. For
him, Loewen’s dedication to the
cause of ending global hunger and
helping people in need “propelled
the program and organization for-
ward. He was always loyal, and committed to the tasks at hand.”
Loewen’s dedication is also something remembered by Jim Cornelius,
current executive director of the CFGB.
“When a job needed to be done,
Bert could be counted on to get it
done, always keeping in mind the ultimate goal of fighting global hunger,”
he says.
In 2010, Loewen was the recipient of
the Order of Manitoba, the province’s
highest honour, largely because of the
vital role he played in the establishment of the CFGB.
Today, the CFGB is providing over
$40 million in annual assistance
around the world, providing food
where it is needed, and supporting the
efforts of households and communities to improve their farming, livelihoods and nutrition.
WHAT’S UP
Please forward your agricultural
events to daveb@fbcpublishing.
com or call 204-944-5762.
Feb. 14-16: Western Canadian
Holistic Management Conference,
Russell Inn and George P. Buleziuk
Conference Centre, Russell. For
more info call 204-648-3965 or to
register and get details visit www.
canadianfga.com.
Feb. 18-19: Prairie Organics: Think
Whole Farm, 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.,
Agriculture Building, 66 Dafoe Rd.,
University of Manitoba, Winnipeg.
Visit www.prairieorganics.ca for
details.
March 1: Manitoba Turkey
Producers annual meeting,
Victoria Inn, 1808 Wellington Ave.,
Winnipeg. For more info call 204489-4635.
March 1-3: Canola Council of
Canada annual convention,
Loews Coronado Bay Hotel, 4000
Coronado Bay Rd., San Diego. For
more info or to register visit con
vention.canolacouncil.org.
March 8: Farm Credit Canada
(FCC) Forum, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.,
Victoria Inn, 1808 Wellington
Ave., Winnipeg. For more info or
to register visit www.fcc-fac.ca/
en/events/fcc-forums.html.
PROFIT FLOWS.
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Oils — only Nexera™ canola reflects a growing value chain that
produces the highest returns per acre, year after year.
GROW WITH NEXERA. EXPERIENCE THE PROFIT.™
healthierprofits.ca
March 11-12: Direct Farm
Marketing Conference, Canad
Inns, 2401 Saskatchewan Ave.,
Portage la Prairie. For more info
visit www.directfarmmarketing.
com.
April 18: CropLife Canada’s
Manitoba provincial council annual general meeting, 9:30 a.m. to
3 p.m., Canadian International
Grains Institute, 1000-303 Main
St., Winnipeg.
A great way to
Buy and Sell
without the ef for t.
Classifieds
45385_Nexera_DPS_Profit Flows_17_4x10_MC_a2.indd 1
9
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
McDonald’s Canada announces
investment in beef research
One of Canada’s largest fast-food companies sees value in the Manitoba Beef and Forage Initiative
BY JENNIFER PAIGE
Co-operator staff/Brandon
M
cDonald’s Canada has
put its money where its
mouth is with an investment into the Manitoba Beef and
Forage Initiative (MBFI).
“We are trying to balance
being responsive to our customers and responsible to our
downstream supply chain,”
said Jeffery Fitzpatrick-Stilwell,
manager of sustainability and
g ov e r n m e n t re l a t i o n s f o r
McDonald’s Canada. “I really
look at this investment as being
a part of that responsible side.
We are being responsible by supporting the science and research
that will build up the capacity
for Canadian agriculture to be
even more sustainable.”
At the Manitoba Beef Producers
(MBP) 37th annual general
meeting held on February 4 in
Brandon, Fitzpatrick-Stilwell
announced that McDonald’s
Canada will invest $25,000 in
MBFI for an annual production
day tour.
“We are very, very excited about
this investment,” said Ramona
Blyth, president of MBFI. “We see
great value in this partnership.”
“I think that it is great to be able
to bring people from the agriculture, environment and now from
the food industry, all together,”
said Charlotte Crawley of Ducks
Unlimited Canada, a partner
organization in the initiative. “It is
a nice marriage of all three industries and I am very excited about
the opportunity.”
The exact details of the annual
tour are in the early planning
stages but representatives say the
tour will be producer focused.
“This tour will give producers
the opportunity to come out and
see research on a demonstration
level and get ideas of what they
may want to do in their own operations,” said Blyth.
Fitzpatrick-Stilwell says this
investment is geared specifically
towards supporting producers
in McDonald’s Canada’s downstream supply chain.
“Any time there is a really
unique opportunity to support
a multi-stakeholder, collaborative effort, it is something that
we like to do,” said FitzpatrickStilwell. “We are pretty excited to
make this investment as it will aid
research at a ground level that is
focused around production methods and will be a benefit to our
Canadian producers.”
® TM
Jeffery Fitzpatrick-Stilwell,
manager of sustainability and
government relations for McDonald’s
Canada. photo: jennifer paige
Although the majority of the
beef McDonald’s sources comes
from Alberta, Fitzpatrick-Stilwell
acknowledges that much of that
product starts out in Manitoba.
Trademark of The Dow Chemical Company (“Dow”) or an affiliated company of Dow.
08/15-45385
“We have a 100 per cent commitment to serve Canadian beef
and McDonald’s understands
the realities of Canadian production. We know that a portion of
the beef supply that ends up on
our customers’ plates was born in
Manitoba. So it is important for us
to support initiatives here,” said
Fitzpatrick-Stilwell.
With an understanding of where its expertise
lies, Fitzpatrick-Stilwell says
McDonald’s Canada will maintain
an appropriate level of involvement with MBFI.
“We will take our lead from
the experts as we always do and
we will be as involved as we can
be,” said Fitzpatrick-Stilwell.
“From our perspective we don’t
need to understand all of the
research details but we do need
to understand what is going on.
It is not just about writing the
cheque. We want to be involved
but at an appropriate level for our
expertise.”
Fi t z p a t r i c k - St i l we l l s a y s
McDonald’s Canada representatives plan to visit the research sites
and will return every year for the
annual tour.
“This production day is going
to be a unique opportunity for
us to involve some of the people
from our value chain. I would
really love to get a few franchisees
to come out and broaden their
awareness on where the food that
they are selling comes from,” said
Fitzpatrick-Stilwell.
MBFI has had a productive
first year in operations with a
number of research projects well
underway.
“This initiative has been quite
the undertaking. A lot of groups
have come together and a lot
of work has been done behind
the scenes to make this thing a
reality,” said Duncan Morrison,
Manitoba Forage and Grasslands
Association representative with
MBFI. “We are now reaching the
exciting time where these projects
are really beginning to take off.
There are a lot of areas of focus
in these research projects on forage. It is really giving the cattle
and forage relationship a platform and we see this as a shiny
opportunity.”
MBFI does not have an exact
date, but will hold its grand opening sometime this summer once
crops are in the ground, cows and
calves are in the pasture and infrastructure is in place.
The initiative recently established its website, which can provide an overview of the research
projects, keep you up to date on
coming events and also provides a
venue for input.
“Our website is up and running. There is a form on there
that you can input your research
ideas and that comes directly
to me. I will take in those ideas
and pass them on to our producer advisory panel for consideration,” said Carollyne
Kehler, project co-ordinator with
MBFI. “This investment from
McDonald’s Canada really goes
to show you how important this
kind of research is. Hopefully we
can continue to have projects
that will be beneficial for producers, students and the public.”
For more information on MBFI,
visit: www.MBFI.ca.
[email protected]
2/4/16 12:47 PM
10
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
LIVESTOCK MARKETS
(Friday to Thursday)
Winnipeg
Slaughter Cattle
Steers
—
Heifers
—
D1, 2 Cows
95.00 - 105.00
D3 Cows
88.00 - 95.00
Bulls
134.00 - 139.00
Feeder Cattle (Price ranges for feeders refer to top-quality animals only)
Steers
(901+ lbs.)
180.00 - 209.50
(801-900 lbs.)
205.00 - 219.00
(701-800 lbs.)
215.00 - 239.00
(601-700 lbs.)
235.00 - 273.00
(501-600 lbs.)
250.00 - 288.00
(401-500 lbs.)
265.00 - 310.00
Heifers
(901+ lbs.)
180.00 - 209.50
(801-900 lbs.)
205.00 - 21900
(701-800 lbs.)
215.00 - 239.00
(601-700 lbs.)
235.00 - 273.00
(501-600 lbs.)
25.00 - 288.00
(401-500 lbs.)
265.00 - 310.00
Heifers
Alberta South
—
—
96.00 - 114.00
80.00 - 98.00
—
$ 202.00 - 212.00
210.00 - 221.00
220.00 - 237.00
238.00 - 260.00
265.00 - 290.00
291.00 - 319.00
$ 186.00 -193.00
192.00 - 204.00
200.00 - 215.00
213.00 - 229.00
231.00 - 251.00
245.00 - 272.00
($/cwt)
(1,000+ lbs.)
(850+ lbs.)
(901+ lbs.)
(801-900 lbs.)
(701-800 lbs.)
(601-700 lbs.)
(501-600 lbs.)
(401-500 lbs.)
(901+ lbs.)
(801-900 lbs.)
(701-800 lbs.)
(601-700 lbs.)
(501-600 lbs.)
(401-500 lbs.)
Feeder Cattle
January 2016
March 2016
April 2016
May 2016
August 2016
September 2016
Cattle Slaughter
February 5, 2016
Manitoba cattle prices hold
against a rising loonie
Chicago futures suggest the market’s peaking, for now
CNSC
Close
156.53
156.03
155.40
156.33
154.58
152.73
Change
-4.78
-3.40
-3.55
-1.88
-4.75
-4.78
Cattle Grades (Canada)
Week Ending
January 29, 2016
51,940
11,849
40,091
N/A
567,000
Previous
Year­
47,363
10,394
36,969
N/A
569,000
Week Ending
January 29, 2016
1,336
26,301
12,160
655
648
9,872
278
Prime
AAA
AA
A
B
D
E
Previous
Year
608
21,025
14,056
392
629
9,649
65
Hog Prices
(Friday to Thursday) ($/100 kg)
Source: Manitoba Agriculture
E - Estimation
MB. ($/hog)
MB (All wts.) (Fri-Thurs.)
MB (Index 100) (Fri-Thurs.)
ON (Index 100) (Mon.-Thurs.)
PQ (Index 100) (Mon.-Fri.)
Current Week
175 E
165 E
159.33
160.74
Futures (February 5, 2016) in U.S.
Hogs
February 2016
April 2016
May 2016
June 2016
July 2016
Last Week
168.61
159.31
152.46
152.99
Close
65.13
70.25
76.83
80.78
80.30
Last Year (Index 100)
172.56
160.34
155.77
163.29
Change
-0.17
0.55
0.92
1.00
0.80
Winnipeg
Wooled Fats
—
—
145.00 - 150.00
150.00 - 165.00
160.00 - 180.00
—
Chickens
Minimum broiler prices as of April 13, 2010
Under 1.2 kg..................................................$1.5130
1.2 - 1.65 kg....................................................$1.3230
1.65 - 2.1 kg....................................................$1.3830
2.1 - 2.6 kg.....................................................$1.3230
Turkeys
Minimum prices as of February 7, 2016
Broiler Turkeys
(6.2 kg or under, live weight truck load average)
Grade A ................................................$1.925
Undergrade ........................................$1.835
Hen Turkeys
(between 6.2 and 8.5 kg liveweight truck load average)
Grade A .................................................$1.915
Undergrade .........................................$1.815
Light Tom/Heavy Hen Turkeys
(between 8.5 and 10.8 kg liveweight truck load average)
Grade A .................................................$1.915
Undergrade .........................................$1.815
Tom Turkeys
(10.8 and 13.3 kg, live weight truck load average)
Grade A..................................................$1.880
Undergrade.......................................... $1.795
Prices are quoted f.o.b. producers premise.
harold unrau
Grunthal Livestock Auction Mart
ience in the face of a surging Canadian dollar. The loonie has shot up in recent days,
at one point trading above 73 U.S. cents last
week, as it came off the lows suffered at the
hands of plunging crude oil prices.
Action south of the border may also start
to weigh on the Manitoba market in the days
to come. Profit-taking at the close on Feb. 5
pushed down Chicago futures and there are
ideas the North America market may have
hit a short-term peak.
Record amounts of pork and poultry continue to cut into the meat market, while a
growing amount of meat in the U.S. sits in
cold storage.
Closer to home, good weather and plentiful feed are making life easier for many producers, said Unrau. “It was a little muddy in
December, but now it’s really good.”
Calving season, he said, will likely dominate a lot of the attention now.
“They’ll want to get rid of their yearlings
before they start calving again so they can
give their new calves all their attention.”
Producers are also being reminded that
if they recently dewormed their cattle with
Ivomec, cows and bulls can’t be slaughtered
for 49 days from the time of the application.
Dave Sims writes for Commodity News Service Canada, a
Winnipeg company specializing in grain and commodity
market reporting.
NEWs
Back-month contracts were delayed pending a review of the COOL repeal
Sheep and Lambs
Choice
(110+ lb.)
(95 - 109 lb.)
(80 - 94 lb.)
(Under 80 lb.)
(New crop)
C
attle prices hung relatively steady at
Manitoba auction marts for the week
ended Feb. 5. While lightweight feeders are no longer commanding the $400
bids they were garnering last fall, there still
seems to be solid demand based on prices.
“Feeders, butchers cows, bulls — all seem
to be fairly level for the past three weeks,”
said Harold Unrau of Grunthal Livestock
Auction Mart, during an interview over the
phone while attending the annual Manitoba
Beef Producers meeting in Brandon.
Other operators noted there seems to be
a growing number of cattle showing flesh,
which is being discounted. Another auction
yard found butcher cows and bulls trading
$2-$4 lower, with top bulls drawing bids of
$134-$135.
Volumes were over 10,000 head for the
second week in a row. Unrau said that
number could likely increase in the coming weeks, though, as ranchers begin to sell
their calves.
“Going into the calving season, a lot of
people will be forced to sell their calves
because they don’t have room for two calf
crops on the yard,” he said, adding more
yearlings will be finding their way to market.
Some producers were also likely waiting
for prices to go up, he noted. However, with
prices showing some stability now, there
could be more of an inclination to sell.
“Most producers are happy with the way
the price is now. They’d love to see the prices
back to where they were but they’re still
happy.”
The Manitoba market also showed resil-
New live cattle futures, options to resume
Other Market Prices
$/cwt
Ewes
Lambs
“Most producers (would) love to
see the prices back to where they
were but they’re still happy.”
DAVE SIMS
Ontario
$ 144.28 - 182.42
156.18 - 178.72
77.53 - 105.60
77.53 - 105.60
122.44 - 141.29
$ 190.73 - 224.76
180.15 -219.43
200.30 - 240.64
211.85 - 265.92
225.45 - 284.00
217.20 - 290.50
$ 160.60 - 190.37
183.42 - 202.81
184.70 - 214.78
192.77 - 231.02
201.44 - 255.03
210.80 - 251.05
$
Futures (February 5, 2016) in U.S.
Fed Cattle
Close
Change
February 2016
137.08
1.65
April 2016
135.65
1.13
June 2016
124.80
0.83
August 2016
120.93
0.52
October 2016
121.45
0.08
December 2016
121.63
0.03
Canada
East
West
Manitoba
U.S.
$1 Cdn: $0.7285 U.S.
$1 U.S: $1.3726 Cdn.
column
Cattle Prices
Slaughter Cattle
Grade A Steers
Grade A Heifers
D1, 2 Cows
D3 Cows
Bulls
Steers
EXCHANGES:
February 7, 2016
Toronto
117.45 - 155.37
139.43 - 151.98
150.48 - 177.64
180.76 - 232.83
215.18 - 283.22
—
SunGold
Specialty Meats
—
Eggs
Minimum prices to producers for ungraded
eggs, f.o.b. egg grading station, set by the
Manitoba Egg Producers Marketing Board
effective November 10, 2013.
New
Previous
A Extra Large
$2.00
$2.05
A Large
2.00
2.05
A Medium
1.82
1.87
A Small
1.40
1.45
A Pee Wee
0.3775
0.3775
Nest Run 24 +
1.8910
1.9390
B
0.45
0.45
C
0.15
0.15
Chicago/Reuters
CME Group plans to
resume its listing schedule
for live cattle futures and
options contracts, effective
Feb. 18, the exchange said
in a statement Feb. 3.
CME said it will post the
June 2017 live cattle futures
and options contract that
was originally scheduled to
be listed on Jan. 4.
T h e e xc h a n g e s a i d i t
will not amend CME Rule
10101, which does not
allow delivery of non-U.S.-
origin cattle, and will continue to require that all
cattle delivered against the
contract must be born and
raised only in the U.S.
CME Group temporarily
delayed listing new contracts in early December
2015 to evaluate possible
delivery changes of nonU.S.-origin cattle in anticipation of a repeal of beef,
a s a c ov e re d c o m m o d ity, subject to mandatory
country-of-origin labelling
(COOL) requirements.
Later that month, the
U.S. Congress passed
a b ro a d 2 0 1 6 s p e n d i n g
package that included the
repeal of COOL in order to
avoid more than US$1 billion in trade retaliation by
Mexico and Canada.
“Up o n f e e d b a c k f ro m
market participants, and
the lack of publicly available data on discounts
o r p re m i u m s b a s e d o n
the countr y of origin of
slaughter cattle, CME has
determined not to amend
Rule 10101 regarding
country-of-origin delivery
at this time,” the exchange
said.
Goats
Kids
Billys
Mature
Winnipeg
(Hd Fats)
130.00 - 160.00
200.00 - 260.00
—
Toronto
($/cwt)
130.57 - 248.21
—
107.00 - 248.21
Horses
<1,000 lbs.
1,000 lbs.+
Winnipeg
($/cwt)
—
—
Toronto
($/cwt)
38.00 - 64.74
49.00 - 81.00
Looking for results? Check out the market reports
from livestock auctions around the province. » PaGe 14
11
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
GRAIN MARKETS
column
Manitoba Elevator Prices
Average quotes as of February 8, 2016 ($/tonne)
StatsCan data seen confirming
a big 2015-16 canola crop
Future
Basis
Cash
E. Manitoba wheat
180.50
48.40
228.90
W. Manitoba wheat
180.50
39.67
220.18
E. Manitoba canola
468.80
-19.19
449.61
W. Manitoba canola
468.80
-24.22
444.58
The loonie’s gains have dragged on canola export demand
Phil-Franz Warkentin
CNSC
I
CE Futures Canada canola contracts
moved lower during the week ended Feb.
5, hitting some of their worst levels in
months as the rising Canadian dollar, losses
in Chicago soybeans and the large supply
situation in Western Canada all weighed on
prices.
The Canadian dollar posted big gains relative to its U.S. counterpart during the week,
climbing above the 73 U.S. cent mark at one
point before eventually backing away to settle at around 72 U.S. cents on Friday. The
currency was below 68 U.S. cents not that
long ago, and the improvement on that front
should cut into crush margins and export
demand.
The other big canola-related news during the week was the release of Statistics
Canada’s report on stocks as of Dec. 31. The
December stocks report is not really a marquee event in the canola calendar, but market participants were paying it a bit more
attention than normal this year, as it was
expected to answer some persistent questions about production.
Heading into the stocks report, opinions
were divided over the size of the 2015-16
canola crop, with some in the industr y
thinking StatsCan’s current 17.2-milliontonne estimate was overstated and others
of the opinion that the actual crop was bigger still. Canola stocks came in at the high
end of average trade guesses, at 12.1 million
tonnes, which was seen as confirming the
big crop number.
From a chart standpoint, canola was
flirting with major support levels during the week. The March contract fell
below the psychological $470-per-tonne
level, and touched a low of $465. The contract has tested that point on three separate occasions over the past six months
and past activity would imply a corrective
bounce is coming. However, this may also
be the time when the downside support is
finally breached.
South America’s soybean harvest is in its
early stages, and attention in the oilseed
markets is focused on the shifting production estimates out of the region. While there
are still some areas of concern, crops in
Brazil and Argentina are generally expected
to be large overall, and will soon displace
North American oilseed supplies on the global market.
CBOT soybeans moved down during the
week, while corn and wheat futures were
also trending lower.
The Canadian stocks report was also
behind some of the activity in the U.S. wheat
market during the week. StatsCan pegged
Canadian wheat stocks, as of Dec. 31, at 20.7
million tonnes, down by six million from the
same point the previous year. The tighter
supplies were seen as a sign of the good
international demand for Canadian wheat,
as the weakness in the loonie has helped
Canadian exporters make sales while U.S.
wheat remains relatively expensive.
Phil Franz-Warkentin writes for Commodity News Service
Canada, a Winnipeg company specializing in grain and
commodity market reporting.
For three-times-daily market reports and more from
Commodity News Service Canada, visit the Markets section at
www.manitobacooperator.ca.
Source: pdqinfo.ca
Port Prices
As of Friday, February 5, 2016 ($/tonne)
Last Week
Weekly Change
U.S. hard red winter 12% Houston
187.94
-6.60
U.S. spring wheat 14% Portland
223.67
-2.29
Canola Thunder Bay
474.30
-9.60
Canola Vancouver
493.30
-10.60
Closing Futures Prices
As of Monday, February 8, 2016 ($/tonne)
Last Week
Weekly Change
ICE canola
468.30
-9.60
ICE milling wheat
226.00
-9.00
ICE barley
190.00
0.00
Mpls. HRS wheat
181.70
-0.28
Chicago SRW wheat
173.71
0.18
Kansas City HRW wheat
168.93
-1.84
Corn
145.07
1.18
Oats
127.25
-1.78
Soybeans
321.33
2.48
Soymeal
294.90
0.77
Soyoil
688.84
12.13
Cash Prices Winnipeg
As of Monday, February 8, 2016 ($/tonne)
Last Week
Weekly Change
Feed wheat
202.44
6.61
Feed barley
179.59
-3.22
Rye
Flaxseed
Feed peas
n/a
n/a
46.33
-6.30
n/a
n/a
Oats
177.67
-7.13
Soybeans
380.30
-12.49
16.80
unch
Ask
Ask
Sunflower (NuSun) Fargo, ND ($U.S./CWT)
Sunflower (Confection) Fargo, ND ($U.S./CWT)
Prairie spring wheat bids slide lower
A stronger loonie and weaker U.S. futures pressure wheat prices
BY PHIL FRANZ-WARKENTIN
CNS Canada
C
ash spring wheat bids across
Western Canada moved lower
during the week ended Feb.
5, as the firmer Canadian dollar
and losses in U.S. wheat futures
weighed on values.
Ave ra g e Ca n a d a We s t e r n Re d
Spring (CWRS) wheat prices were
down by $4-$6 per tonne over the
week, according to price quotes
from a cross-section of delivery
points across the Prairie provinces,
compiled by PDQ (Price and Data
Quotes). Average pr ices ranged
from about $219 to $220 per tonne
in southeastern Saskatchewan and
western Manitoba, to as high as
$234 in southern Alberta.
Quoted basis levels varied from
location to location, but softened
by about $5 per tonne on average to sit roughly at about $38-$53
per tonne above the futures, when
using the grain company methodology of quoting the basis as the
difference between U.S. dollardenominated futures and Canadian
dollar cash bids.
When accounting for the currency exchange rates by adjusting
the Canadian prices to U.S. dollars,
CWRS bids ranged from US$157 to
$168 per tonne. That would put the
currency adjusted basis levels at
about US$13-$24 below the futures.
Looking at it the other way
around, if the Minneapolis futures
are converted to Canadian dollars,
CWRS basis levels across Western
Canada range f ro m $ 2 1 t o $ 3 3
below the futures.
Average Canada Prairie Spring
Red (CPSR) bids were down by as
much as $13-$17 per tonne. Average
CPSR prices came in at about $169$175 per tonne in Saskatchewan,
and $183 per tonne in Alberta.
Average durum prices were down
during the week, losing anywhere
from $3 to $6 per tonne. Bids in
southern Saskatchewan, where the
bulk of the crop is grown, were down
by $4, to sit at roughly $306 per tonne.
The March spring wheat contract in Minneapolis, off of which
most CWRS contracts in Canada are
based, was quoted at US$4.9125 per
bushel on Feb. 5, down 8.75 U.S.
cents from the previous week.
Kansas City hard red winter wheat
futures, traded in Chicago, are more
closely linked to CPSR in Canada.
The March K.C. wheat contract was
quoted at US$4.54 per bushel on
Feb. 5, down 18 U.S. cents compared
to the previous week.
T h e Ma rc h C h i c a g o Bo a rd o f
Trade soft wheat contract settled
at US$4.6675 on Feb. 5, which was
US12.5 cents lower compared to
one week earlier.
The Canadian dollar closed at
71.9 U.S. cents on Feb. 5, up by
about half a cent relative to its U.S.
counterpart compared to the previous week.
12
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
LIVESTOCK
h u s b a n d r y — t h e s c i e n c e , S K I L L O R ART O F F AR M IN G
Enrichment comes in many forms
Not just toys for pigs, enrichment makes swine smarter and easier to transport
BY SHANNON VANRAES
Co-operator staff
T
he time for thinking about
enrichment as “toys for
pigs” has long passed.
Speaking to producers and
members of the pork industry at
the Manitoba Swine Seminar in
Winnipeg, Jennifer Brown said
not only is enrichment mandatory under the current code
of practice, it actually provides
benefits to both animals and
those who handle them.
“Of course the other important thing, is that enrichment
doesn’t have to be expensive,”
said the Prairie Swine Centre
researcher. “There are many
practical options.”
Brown said the economic
benefits of enrichment are
most evident with grow-finisher
pigs, where providing enrichment can significantly reduce
tail biting and other forms of
aggression. In grow-finisher
barns, enrichment results in less
injuries, less culling and fewer
deaths overall.
However, producers must
remember that finisher pigs are
also more powerful and more
destructive when it comes to
enrichment and require robust
items that can take prolonged
and intense chewing sessions.
“Sections of chain, wood
mounted in a holder or on a
chain, and short sections of PVC
pipe have been used successfully,” said Brown, adding that
pigs at this stage prefer items
like wood that they can eventually destroy.
Not as much research has
been done on enrichment for
sows being housed in stalls, she
said, but group-housed sows
can be treated similarly to finisher pigs.
Even how a barn is designed
can result in enrichment, said
Brown. Providing “bedroom
areas and hallways” is one way
to introduce stimulation, as is
providing varied types of flooring. Small amounts of straw
can be introduced too, enough
for animals to explore and root
through, although fully slatted
systems may be challenging to
adapt.
“Anything that changes up
the visual, the auditory environment, is enrichment as well,”
Brown added. “You’re presenting the animals with a varied
soundscape so that when they
are in movement or in transport
this is not a shock to them.”
Changing up feed can also
provide animals with enrichment. Sows in particular benefit from being given hay and
high-fibre foods, which Brown
explained can reduce aggression
by increasing satiety.
Piglets can benefit from a
variety of rubber toys, including dog toys, which can be easily
cleaned. Handlers should note
however, that novelty does wear
off and that enrichment items
should be rotated with a rest
period of about five days before
they are reintroduced.
A barn in Holland in which piglets are given burlap sacks to play with. Photo: Laura Rance
“You can definitely
see why you would
want to implement
these sorts of
things.”
Jennifer Brown
Brown said that research has
even shown that pigs given
enrichment from birth are
more intelligent than animals
that don’t have enrichment,
making it easier for them to
adapt to change and overcome
fear.
“That’s especially important
if you are planning to develop
gilts for an electronic feeding
system,” she added. “It also
increases an animal’s ability to cope with behavioural
and physiological changes,
stress at transport, changing
pens, moving sows around…
so you can definitely see why
you would want to implement
these sorts of things.”
[email protected]
Jennifer Brown Photo: Shannon VanRaes
13
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COLUMN
Calving problems are
decreasing, but stay vigilant
Vets aren’t called out during calving as often as they used to be,
but producers need to know when to call for backup
ROY LEWIS DVM
Beef 911
W
ith genetic selection of
lower birth weights and
easy calving bulls, calving problems due to fetal oversize
are becoming rarer and rarer.
But there are still common
problems, which are worth
reviewing to help producers recognize and assist these deliveries
to save more calves as calving season is upon us.
Fetal malpresentations today
are the most common calving difficulties we see. The simple front
leg(s) back are often corrected
by the producer. Gently repelling the body and head back will
give enough room to bring the
leg around. This places the calf in
the normal position to be pulled.
Occasionally a cow can deliver a
calf with one foot back depending
on the size of her pelvic opening
versus the size of the calf. Always
try and assist a backwards calving.
Twinning is in the range of up to
five to six per cent in some herds
and this poses a much greater
risk of malpresentation because
of the eight legs and two heads.
The various combinations these
body parts can be presented in
can really be a puzzle to sort out.
Most common one is backwards
(usually the first one) and one is
forwards. They can both be trying
to come together.
A few tricks producers can do to
sort things out is to first remember the top calf must be the one
to come out first. Secondly, follow the leg back to the body and
make sure you are pulling on two
legs from the same calf. To determine between back and front legs
there are one of two things, which
must be felt. If you can follow
the legs back the neck and head
should be found if front legs or
the tail found if back legs. That is
the obvious. If you can’t reach that
far if you check the first two joints
they bend the same way in the
front legs and the opposite way
if the back legs. If both calves are
coming forward, four front legs
need to be sorted out. If a cow had
twins in the previous year or two,
watch her extra closely as they
often repeat.
My rule of thumb for any of
these malpresentations is if no
progress is being made after 20
minutes, call your veterinarian.
The vaginal vault will be drying
out and time running out as well.
Keep in mind you are generally
behind with malpresentations
since the uterine contractions
may be delayed or the water bag
or feet showing may not happen as with normal calvings. As
a result there is an increased percentage of stillborn.
The most common malpresentation veterinarians are called to
are complete breech births where
the calf is presented tail first into
the birth chamber. It takes skill
and experience to bring the back
legs around without damaging
the cow’s uterus. Again, there is a
higher incidence of this with twin
births. And with just the butt end
presented, often the cow delays
pushing. Whether this is because
nothing is presented into the
pelvis one can only speculate. I
do know over half of these presented to us are stillborn. The
cow will often look uneasy and
start making a bed but won’t get
down to the act of calving. With
many, the entire placenta is presented when the calf is delivered.
The navel cord may be wrapped
around the legs and veterinarians must be careful to not rip
this during the delivery.
Torsion of the uterus is rare, but
it is important for the producer to
recognize this situation right away
and call for help. Upon doing your
vaginal exam, you get the impression your hand and arm are going
through a corkscrew with apparent tight tissue crossing your path.
When you do reach the calf, it
may appear upside down and the
opening is not uniform like a partially dilated cervix.
Call for help right away, as a few
options are available. The calf may
be able to be rolled by an experienced veterinarian, the cow rolled
and the calf held or if both these
are unsuccessful a caesarean section performed.
Ve t e r i n a r i a n s g e n e r a l l y
become involved when there
are fetal monsters, fetal hydrops
(excessive fluid in the calf’s abdomen), schistosomas reflexus (an
inside-out calf ), and other rare
conditions. The calves are usually non-viable and are delivered
by C-section or, in many cases, a
fetotomy. This is where the veterinarian will cut the fetus apart
using obstetrical wire and an
instrument called a fetotome. All
are undesirable options, but the
life of the cow is spared.
We also see the cases where
there is something wrong with
the pelvis of the cow. The tail head
and spine may have dropped
down making the pelvic opening
very small or there may be a mass
or some obstruction in the pelvis.
The solution is again a caesarean
section even though the calf is
normal size. These cows are obviously culled out in subsequent
years.
The days of lots of C-sections
and hard pulls are over. With good
bull and female selection, calving problems from fetal oversize
are very rare. Another problem
worth mentioning is our heifers
are maturing early and the older
calves can be bred at only a few
months of age. These of course
commonly have dystocias (calving problems) due to small pelvic
openings but by pulling bulls or
pregnancy checking our yearling
heifers, we can eliminate these
unwanted pregnancies in young
heifers.
Overall, veterinarians are called
a lot less than they formerly were
— which is a good thing. The
important thing is still being diligent at calving and to recognize
when there is a problem and act
on it quickly. If you don’t make
progress yourself in 20 minutes,
call in backup. If a calving isn’t
proceeding in the normal time,
intervene as most often you may
detect a malpresentation or torsion early in time to save the calf.
Here’s to a fruitful and problemfree calving season.
Drought-related
tax deferral
zones expand
About 27,000 in the West were impacted
by dry weather in 2015
Eligible producers
will be able to
request the tax
deferral when
filing their 2015
income tax
returns.
STAFF
M
ore livestock producers in northwestern Manitoba who
had to sell breeding stock
due to drought in the 2015
tax year will be able to defer
some or most of that income
at tax time.
Federal Agriculture
Minister Lawrence MacAulay
on Feb. 2 announced more
designated areas in all four
western provinces where producers will be eligible for livestock tax deferral provisions,
on top of the areas already
designated in July 2015.
From April 1 to July 21 in
2015, 60 per cent of farmland
in the West received belownormal precipitation, impacting forage production. The
affected area now represents
about 27,000 farms and over
5.8 million cattle, the government said.
The low moisture levels
resulted in “significant forage shortages for livestock
producers across Western
Canada,” forcing some to sell
all or part of their breeding
herds.
In Manitoba, designations
added Feb. 2 included the RM
of Riding Mountain West and
the Municipality of Ste. Rose.
Other jurisdictions already
designated included the
RMs of Alonsa, Dauphin,
G r a h a m d a l e, L a w re n c e,
Mossey River, Mountain
(North and South), Ochre
River and Siglunes; the
municipalities of Gilbert
Plains, Grandview, Ethelbert,
Hillbsurg-Roblin-Shell-River,
Minitonas-Bowsman and
Swan Valley West; Valley River
First Nation 63A; and unor-
ganized Divisions 18 (east
part), 19, 20 (north and south
parts) and 21.
In designated areas, eligible
producers who sold breeding livestock may be allowed
to defer some or most of the
income tax on those sales
for one year. Proceeds from
deferred sales are included as
income in the next tax year,
to be “at least partially offset”
by the cost of buying breeding
animals.
Eligible producers will be
able to request the tax deferral when filing their 2015
income tax returns.
To qualify, a producer’s
breeding herd must have
been reduced by at least 15
per cent, from which 30 per
cent of income from net sales
can then be deferred.
Where a herd has been
reduced by more than 30 per
cent, 90 per cent of income
from eligible net sales can be
deferred.
Producers in areas that get
consecutive years of drought
or excess moisture designation will be able to defer
sales income to the first year
in which their areas are no
longer designated. In 2014,
Manitoba saw several designations due to excess moisture.
Roy Lewis practised large-animal
veterinary medicine for more than 30
years and now works part time as a
technical services veterinarian for Merck
Animal Health.
100 RED & BLACK SIMMENTAL BULLS
R PLUS SIMMENTALS
R PLUS SIMMENTALS
Ross LeBlanc & Sons
Box 1476 Estevan, SK S4A 2L7
Ross LeBlanc & Sons
Box 1476 Estevan, SK S4A 2L7
Marlin 306.634.8031
Cell
306.421.2470
Marlin 306.634.8031
SALES MANAgEMENT:
Cell
306.421.2470
Ross
306.421.1824
oBI
Ross
Jason
306.421.9909
RoB HoLowAyCHUK
Jason
306.421.9909
306.421.1824
780.916.2628
MARK HoLowAyCHUK
403.896.4990
Sales Management:
Sales Management:
OBI
OBI
R PLUS SIMMENTALS
Rob Holowaychuk
780.916.2628
Rob Holowaychuk
780.916.2628
Box 1476 ESTEVAN, SK S4A 2L7
Mark Holowaychuk
403.896.4990
Mark Holowaychuk
403.896.4990
MARLIN LEBLANC
(CELL) 306.421.2470
(CELL) 306.421.9637
(HoME) 306.634.8031
14
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
LIVESTOCK AUCTION RESULTS
Weight Category
Ashern
Feeder Steers
Gladstone
Grunthal
Heartland
Heartland
Brandon
Virden
Killarney
Ste. Rose
Winnipeg
Feb-03
Feb-02
Feb-02
Feb-04
Feb-03
Feb-01
Feb-04
Feb-05
No. on offer
840
1,008*
280
916
2,929*
763*
1,948*
947
Over 1,000 lbs.
n/a
n/a
180.00-201.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
175.00-196.00
900-1,000
n/a
180.00-205.75
185.00-205.00
198.00-213.00
200.00-209.00
195.00-209.00
205.00-203.00 (206.00)
188.00-198.00
800-900
185.00-212.00
180.00-214.50
190.00-210.00
200.00-221.00
205.00-220.00
205.00-215.00
195.00-213.00 (215.00)
200.00-213.00
700-800
190.00-236.00
210.00-232.50
200.00-230.00
215.00-235.00
218.00-235.00
210.00-225.00 (231.00)
215.00-235.00 (239.00)
208.00-229.00
600-700
210.00-267.00
230.00-258.50
225.00-260.00
235.00-262.00
232.00-256.00 (160.00)
230.00-260.00 (265.50)
230.00-265.00 (268.00)
220.00-260.00
500-600
230.00-279.00
250.00-292.00
250.00-310.00
250.00-287.00
254.00-289.00
255.00-285.00 (290.00)
250.00-289.00
235.00-285.00
400-500
260.00-290.00
270.00-308.00
280.00-305.00
290.00-320.00
275.00-314.00
275.00-305.00 (320.00)
250.00-295.00
260.00-295.00
300-400
n/a
290.00-205.75
295.00-345.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
280.00-310.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
177.00-195.00
183.00-190.00
n/a
185.00-194.00 (195.00)
n/a
800-900
180.00-194.00
170.00-191.50
170.00-185.00
185.00-205.00
186.00-196.00
n/a
193.00-198.00 (200.00)
160.00-179.00
700-800
180.00-208.50
180.00-205.00
180.00-204.00
190.00-210.00
190.00-204.50
n/a
195.00-207.00 (210.00)
190.00-224.00
600-700
185.00-232.00
180.00-223.00
200.00-220.00
205.00-230.00
206.00-227.00
200.00-215.00
210.00-225.00 (227.00)
200.00-236.00
500-600
190.00-240.00
210.00-249.00
215.00-260.00
225.00-251.00
222.00-246.00
215.00-230.00
215.00-248.00 (250.00)
230.00-259.00
400-500
200.00-264.00
240.00-271.00
235.00-265.00
235.00-270.00
235.00-264.00
230.00-251.00
215.00-250.00 (260.00)
220.00-256.00
300-400
n/a
270.00-290.00
250.00-300.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
205.00-272.00 (275.00)
n/a
167
n/a
80
156
n/a
n/a
90.00-101.00 (106.00)
185
D1-D2 Cows
90.00-97.00
n/a
92.00-98.25
94.00-103.00
96.00-103.00
92.00-101.00
80.00-91.00
94.00-101.00
D3-D5 Cows
80.00-92.00
n/a
80.00-88.00
83.00-93.00
88.00-94.00
n/a
n/a
82.00-94.00
Age Verified
98.00-106.00
80.00-103.50
n/a
n/a
97.00-107.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
Good Bulls
Feeder heifers
900-1,000 lbs.
Slaughter Market
No. on offer
120.00-153.50
120.00-137.00
125.00-130.75
125.00-138.00
128.00-139.75
130.00-142.50
125.00-146.00
130.00-135.00
Butcher Steers
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
159.00-167.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
Butcher Heifers
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
158.00-165.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
Feeder Cows
n/a
n/a
100.00-108.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
100.00-110.00
Fleshy Export Cows
n/a
n/a
92.00-98.25
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
80.00-88.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
130.00-195.00
n/a
n/a
n/a
115.00-150.00
n/a
110.00-135.00
n/a
Lean Export Cows
Heiferettes
* includes slaughter market
(Note all prices in CDN$ per cwt. These prices also generally represent the top one-third of sales reported by the auction yard.)
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15
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
SHEEP & GOAT COLUMN
Low pre-Easter numbers at sheep and goat sale
Just five goats on offer at the February 3 sale
By Mark Elliot
Co-operator contributor
W
innipeg Livestock
Auction had 120 sheep
and goats delivered
for the Feb. 3, 2016 sale. Not all
classifications were represented
in this smaller auction, which
was following the pre-Easterseason pattern.
Selection for the ewe classification of ewes was limited, but
still indicated a price difference
between wool and hair ewes.
A 170-pound Dorper-cross
ewe brought $164.90 ($0.97
per pound). A group of two
138-pound wool ewes brought
$161.46 ($1.17 per pound). A
young 135-pound Cheviot-cross
ewe brought $1.35.
Hair rams represented the
ram classification. Weight or
age did not appear to be an issue for the buyers. A 140-pound
briefs
Korea finds hogs
infected with
foot-and-mouth
Seoul/Reuters / South
Korea has detected footand-mouth in a southwestern hog farm, the
first such discovery in
nine months and a blow
to authorities pushing to
contain the disease.
The case involved a type
of the disease that animals
are inoculated against
in South Korea, with all
670 hogs at the infected
farm in the city of Gimje,
about 200 km southwest
of Seoul, to be slaughtered, said an Agriculture
Ministry official.
Another official at the
ministry confirmed the
new discovery of footand-mouth, without giving details.
South Korea struggled to
contain foot-and-mouth
after it was discovered in
the country in July 2014,
intensifying fears about
food safety as the nation
was also grappling with an
outbreak of bird flu. But no
new cases had been discovered since April last year.
The outbreak stoked
pork imports, mainly from
the U.S. and Germany,
with shipments rising
nearly 30 per cent to
around 423,000 tonnes
between January and
November 2015 from a
year earlier, according to
customs data.
A great way to
Buy and Sell
without the ef for t.
Classifieds
Dorper-cross ram brought
$170.80 ($1.22 per pound). Two
113-pound Katahdin-cross
rams brought $157.07 ($1.39).
Two 150-pound Katahdin-cross
rams brought $165 ($1.10 per
pound).
The heavyweight lambs were
represented by a 120-pound Suffolk-cross lamb which brought
$165.60 ($1.38 per pound).
The two groups of 98-pound
market lambs brought $1.59 and
$1.60 per pound. The heavier
market lambs ranging from 103
to 106 pounds brought a price
range from $1.47 to $1.61 per
pound.
A group of fourteen 84-pound
Cheviot-cross lambs brought
$151.20 ($1.80 per pound). A
group of 21 93-pound Cheviotcross lambs brought $154.38
($1.66).
Seven 75-pound Katahdincross lambs represented the
lightweight classification at this
January 6, 2016
Ewes
$180 - $182.25
$189 - $198.90
$161.46 - $164.90
$133.65 - $150
$165.60
$205.20
Lambs (lbs.)
110+
$188.80
95 - 110
$155.82 - $169.05
$175.23 - $187.43
$155 - $166
80 - 94
$151.20 / $154.38
$168.15 - $172.02
$146.08 - $162.87
Under 80
75
sale. These lambs brought $135
($1.80 per pound).
Goats
The goat selection remained
very limited for this sale. No
$135
$124.25 - $143.28 (71 - 77 lbs.)
goat does were available. A
110-pound Alpine-cross goat
buck brought $220 ($2 per
pound). A 135-pound Boercross goat buck brought $235
($1.74).
A 100-pound Alpine-cross
wether brought $165 ($1.65 per
pound). A 170-pound Alpinecross wether brought $210 ($1.24).
A 70-pound Boer-cross goat kid
brought $145 ($2.07 per pound).
16
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
WEATHER VANE
“Everyone talks about the weather, but no one does anything about it.” Mark Twain, 1897
Little change expected in overall pattern
Issued: Monday, February 8, 2016 · Covering: February 10 – February 17, 2016
Daniel Bezte
Weather Vane
T
he battle between cold
air to our northeast and
milder air to our west and
south will continue, with the
overall pattern staying the same
— but as they say, the devil is in
the details.
Take last weekend’s area of low
pressure. The models had predicted this low, but it ended up
a little stronger than expected
and came in a little quicker. The
end result wasn’t more snow
than anticipated; instead we saw
warmer temperatures ahead of
the system and higher winds
as the system pulled out on
Sunday.
This forecast will begin with
an area of arctic high pressure
slowly sliding southeast behind
last weekend’s low. This high
should bring more sun than
clouds, but the way it’s been
going this winter, don’t be surprised if there are more clouds
than sun. This is due to the close
proximity of the milder air to our
west. Temperatures will be on
the cool side, with highs in the
-12 to -15 C range and overnight
lows in the -20 to -24 C range,
possibly a little colder if skies
clear and winds become light.
By the weekend an area of
low pressure will move in off
the Pacific and travel across the
northern and central Prairies,
bringing more clouds and the
chance for a little light snow, along
with milder temperatures. Most
of the light snow looks as if it will
stay to our north, with the best
chance of seeing snow later in the
day on Sunday. Temperatures will
moderate ahead of the low, with
highs by Sunday expected to be in
the -4 C range.
We’ll see a short push of colder
air behind this system, before a
second system slides across the
central Prairies late on Tuesday.
As with most of the systems so far
this winter, only a little light snow
or flurries are expected, with most
falling across central regions.
Temperatures will warm back up
to the -5 C range ahead of the system, with colder air once again
pushing in later in the week.
Usual temperature range for
this period: Highs, -19 to -4 C;
lows, -31 to -12 C.
Daniel Bezte is a teacher by profession
with a BA (Hon.) in geography,
specializing in climatology, from the
U of W. He operates a computerized
weather station near Birds Hill Park.
Contact him with your questions and
comments at [email protected].
WEATHER MAP - WESTERN CANADA
Percent of Average Precipitation (Prairie Region)
November 1, 2015 to February 3, 2016
< 40%
40 - 60%
60 - 85%
85 - 115%
115 - 150%
150 - 200%
> 200%
Extent of Agricultural Land
Lakes and Rivers
Produced using near real-time data that has
undergone initial quality control. The map
may not be accurate for all regions due to data
availability and data errors.
Copyright © 2016 Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada
Prepared by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s National Agroclimate Information Service (NAIS). Data provided through partnership with
Environment Canada, Natural Resources Canada, and many Provincial agencies.
Created: 02/04/16
www.agr.gc.ca/drought
This issue’s map shows the total amount of precipitation that has fallen across the Prairies so far this winter (Nov. 1 to Feb. 3). About half of the
three Prairie provinces has seen below-average amounts (yellow, orange and red areas), with the rest seeing near-average amounts (light
green). Only a few small regions have received slightly above-average amounts and they include southeastern Manitoba along with a few spots
in southwestern Alberta.
Global warming trends: Simple, yet complex
The fluctuations we see from warmer to cooler years are trending toward warmer conditions
BY DANIEL BEZTE
Co-operator contributor
I
always enjoy getting emails
from readers. Most of the
time they’re questions looking for clarification about previous articles. Usually, I try
to reply directly back with an
answer, but sometimes an article generates the same question
from a number of people. From
what I’ve learned about teaching, if one person asks a question, a few more probably have
that same question; if several
people ask the same question,
then many people are probably
asking themselves that same
question.
This was the case with
my article that looked at global temperatures over the last
year, then looked back at the
full global temperature record.
The question asked in several
emails was, “What caused the
warming temperatures during
the first part of the last century
and in particular, the significant
warming that occurred during
the 1940s?” Looking back, I’m
kind of glad I didn’t have room
to do a lot of analysis on the
data, as it appears that forced
a number of you to look and
actually pick apart the data;
well done!
If you go back and look at
the global temperature anom-
Around 1912, global temperatures started to
increase steadily until the late 1930s, when there
was a rapid increase starting around 1937 and
lasting until about 1946.
aly graph that showed yearly
average global temperatures
as a departure from the 20thcentury average you would see
that from 1880 to about 1910,
g l o b a l t e m p e ra t u re s w e re
steady or declined slightly.
Then, starting around 1912,
global temperatures started
to increase slowly but steadily until the late 1930s, when
there was a rapid increase
starting around 1937 and lasting until about 1946. Global
temperatures were then fairly
steady until the mid-1970s,
w h e n t h e y re s u m e d t h e i r
steady increase.
If you look at the graph and
place a best-fit line starting
around 1910 to the present, you
would see that global temperatures, for the most part, have
been steadily increasing with
a bit of a warm blip or jump
during the late 1930s and early
1940s. This “blip” makes it look
like there was a significant cooling period following this rapid
warming until about 1975,
when in reality, the overall trend
was a slow but steady increase
with only a bit of a steady state
period during the 1950s and
early 1960s.
This overall warming trend
fits the timeline of the influence of humans on atmospheric levels of different gases
that are known to increase the
amount of heat the atmosphere is able to trap. Yes,
humans were producing these
gases before this time as the
industrial revolution revved
up, but it took time for atmospheric levels to increase to a
point where they could begin
a f f e c t i n g g l o b a l t e m p e ra tures. As these levels of gases
continued to increase in the
atmosphere, the amount of
heat being trapped increased,
re s u l t i n g i n w a r m e r a n d
warmer global temperatures.
This is pretty simple science
and no one really disputes
this fact; what people dispute
is whether the values we are
seeing are able to cause the
temperature increases we are
seeing.
Fluctuations
While this part is fairly
straightforward, the rest of the
picture is very complex. There
are several different things
that influence atmospheric
temperatures: solar output,
water vapour, cloud cover, pollution — either natural (volcanoes) or human made — and
ocean temperatures, to name
a few of the big ones. Add
to this the various naturally
occurring longer-term weather
patterns or cycles such as El
Ni ñ o - E NSO, t h e Ma d d e n Ju l i a n o s c i l l a t i o n , No r t h
Atlantic oscillation and Arctic
oscillation, again to name
some of the bigger ones. These
all interact together to influence global temperatures over
periods of several years, up to
a decade or so. This is why we
don’t see a steady year-to-year
rise in global temperatures,
but rather, a pattern of fluctuations between warmer and
cooler years that are slowly
increasing toward warmer and
warmer conditions.
Back to the main question:
why the big increase during
the 1940s and the steady temperatures that followed this
period? It seems fairly apparent that the warming leading up to and including this
period was, in part, brought
on by atmospheric changes
tied to human activity. One
train of thought on the rapid
increase in the 1940s is that
this was simply the response
o f t h e a t m o s p h e re t o t h e
increase in human-produced
atmospheric gases — that the
period following this warming would have continued to
warm at or near this pace, like
it has over the last 35 years, if
it wasn’t for atmospheric pollution. The period after the
Second World War saw mass i ve i n d u s t r i a l i z a t i o n a n d
a large jump in atmospheric
pollution levels. Just think
back to images of the giant
smokestacks belching out pollution. This pollution didn’t
help much to trap extra heat
in the atmosphere, but rather
helped to reflect solar radiation or sunshine back into
space, resulting in cooler temperatures. This becomes evident in temperature records
when we look at daily high
and low temperatures for this
period. During the day, when
solar radiation was being partially blocked, temperatures
declined. At night, when this
pollution would not influence
temperatures, since there was
no incoming solar radiation,
global temperatures continued
to slowly increase.
That’s all the room I have
for this issue, but I’ll continue
to expand on this topic in
upcoming issues.
17
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
CROPS
h u s b a n d r y — t h e s c i e n c e , S K I L L O R ART O F F AR M IN G
Discussing drones
A panel of industry experts sheds some light on the drone
landscape for producers interested in investing in the equipment
BY JENNIFER PAIGE
Keep it simple
“From a producer perspective, I
would recommend getting a simple model for about $1,500 to
$2,000. Don’t spend too much
because that won’t give you
the value that you need,” said
Thornton.
The panellist said simpler models don’t produce Normalized
Di f f e re n c e Ve g e t a t i o n In d e x
(NDVI) data, but the green images
they do produce and the aerial
perspective is still highly valuable
and sometimes all a grower needs.
“The equipment that you can
get from about $1,500 won’t give
you NDVI image but just looking at things from a different perspective is a value in itself,” said
Thornton.
“Drones give us a new
resource,” said MacRae. “Any
issues that you can visibly spot in
your fields from the ground can
be seen even better from the air.”
Manitoba Potato Production Days hosted a panel discussion on drones in Brandon on January 27. Dr. Ian MacRae (l to r), professor and
extension entomologist at the University of Minnesota, Craig Linde, diversification specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, Food and Rural
Development, Trevor Thornton, president of Crop Care Consulting, Darren White, agronomist with Delta Ag Services. Photo: JENNIFER PAIGE
Linde agreed, saying drones can
be incredibly useful at acquiring a
better oversight of your operation
but he warned they won’t remove
the requirement of scouting fields.
“Zooming in on plots can certainly be useful, in terms of seeing how applications are progressing throughout the season, and at
the same time, keeping a detailed
record,” said Linde. “Flying allows
us to see areas of vulnerability but
we certainly still need boots on the
ground to be able to examine and
define these areas.”
Complex and time consuming
Panellists said that more complex
drones that produce the NDVI
imagery can be expensive and frustrating when trying to keep up with
the rapidly advancing technology.
“These are great tools but they
are pricey and what goes up,
must come down. Sometimes
in a fiery manner,” said MacRae.
“Advancements are also happening
at a tremendous rate. The software
and technology are being developed and are changing very fast.”
Interpretation of NDVI data can
also be time consuming, complicated and requires a solid Internet
connection to upload data.
“Flying the devices is the easy
part. Interpreting the data that
you collect is the challenge,” said
Thornton.
Thornton says that producers
looking to use drone technology
have a few options: purchasing
all of the equipment and software
themselves, acquiring a drone and
sending the data to a company to
be processed or hiring a company
to both fly and process the data.
“What some of the companies
are suggesting is uploading the data
to their systems to be processed,
which is a great concept. The data
can upload either remotely from
the field or when you get back to
the office. But, a lot of us are rural
so you don’t have great fibre optic
lines and to send all of this information somewhere is going to be
cumbersome. Just because of the
size of the data we are sending,”
said Thornton.
Hiring a drone service at a peracre rate can be an appealing
option as drone companies have
more advanced equipment and
software and can supply NDVI data
without having to invest the time,
or acquire insurance and licence
requirements.
“If someone really wants to get
complete field surveys or look at
variable and diagnostic work,
you are best to hire a service that
is out there to help you out,” said
Thornton.
As with all crop protection products, read and follow label instructions carefully.
Member of CropLife Canada.
I
nterested in diving into the
world of drones? Start small,
a panel of agronomists told
f a r m e r s a t t e nding Manitoba
Potato Production Days Jan. 27.
“I would suggest starting with
a small piece of equipment,”
said Trevor Thornton, president
of Crop Care Consulting. “A lot of
guys want something that they
can keep in their truck and pull
over and launch when they spot
something in the field. These guys
are looking for quick access and
you don’t need to spend a lot of
money to do that.”
Thornton was part of a panel
of four industry advisers who
discussed their experience using
drone equipment, how it is helpful and the direction producers
should take if interested in investing in the equipment.
Ian MacRae, professor and
extension entomologist at the
University of Minnesota, Craig
Linde, diversification specialist
with Manitoba Agriculture, Food
and Rural Development, and
Darren White, agronomist with
Delta Ag Services, also took part
in the panel.
Unless indicated, trademarks with ®, TM or SM are trademarks of DuPont or affiliates. © 2016 DuPont.
Co-operator staff/Brandon
What can NDVI data do for you?
“The NDVI data the drones compile
can show us where chemical application has been missed, repercussions from previous field management, snow cover damage, seeding
misses and how the crop advances
over the course of the season,” said
White.
Data collected can give producers inklings to areas in the field that
need further attention.
Thornton says his company has
been focused on using drone technology with variable-rate fungicide
in the canola. Data collected after
flying over producers’ fields provides insight into when to spray
and when not to spray.
“That is really where the saving
benefits are. Even producers who
didn’t spray or completely sprayed
their fields found value in the
data because it confirmed which
fields were worth spraying,” said
Thornton.
[email protected]
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18
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
High-disturbance seeding can be
as erosive as a plow
Conservation tillage isn’t conserving as much soil as you thought. That’s why
University of Manitoba soil scientist David Lobb says new tillage equipment is needed
BY ALLAN DAWSON
Co-operator staff
T
he era of black summerfallow is over, and direct
seeding and zero tillage have pretty much solved
problems of soil erosion on
the Prairies. Or so goes conventional wisdom.
Not so, says David Lobb, a
professor in the University of
Manitoba’s department of soil
science and senior research
c h a i r f o r t h e Wa t e r s h e d
Systems Research Program
(WSRP).
“I think there has to be
a whole new generation of
tillage equipment developed in the next five to 10
years,” Lobb said in an interview Feb. 4 after speaking at
the Manitoba Soil Science
Society’s 59th annual meeting
in Winnipeg. “It has to be if
you want to deal with the fact
that we have highly variable,
highly degraded landscapes.
“High-disturbance direct
seeding, which is fairly
common on the Canadian
Prairies, can actually result
in as much tillage erosion
soil loss as a mouldboard
plow. Because of the speed,
and variability of speed, it
moves soil much greater distances and with much greater
variability.”
For years farmers and soil
experts put most of the blame
for soil erosion on wind and
water, but research has shown
the biggest culprit is tillage.
Eve n t h o u g h t h e re s e a rc h
proving that has been around
for almost 25 years, Lobb said
it’s still news to many people.
“You should always think
of any soil-engaging tool as a
road grader with holes in the
blade,” he said. “It’s exactly
the way they behave. So anything you can do to accentuate that levelling of the landscape is going to cause soil
loss in one area to accumulate
in another.”
Even zero-till farmers can
erode soil, Lobb said.
“The reality is they may not
be moving as much soil but
the nature of the disturbance
is so variable they’re causing
“I think there has
to be a whole new
generation of tillage
equipment developed
in the next five to 10
years.”
David Lobb
degradation, they’re causing
loss. They don’t appreciate
that.”
Putting it back
After 30 years of zero till,
many farmers still have
IT PAYS to Study Ag
CABEF offers six $2,500 scholarships to Canadian
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degraded hilltops because
they were already eroded and
any soil building due to zero
till is probably lost because
there’s still been some erosion
from seeding, Lobb said.
The good news is that with
tillage erosion, most of the
soil is still nearby, usually
in lower areas of the field.
The soil can be scraped and
dumped back on hilltops.
“It only takes about 10 cm
of topsoil and when you do
that, you get positive change
in the wet years and the dry
years,” Lobb told the meeting.
He said studies show the cost
can be recovered in four to six
years.
“It s h i g h l y e c o n o m i c —
probably the most economic
land management practice
that farmers have access to.”
Tilling and seeding aren’t
the only contributors to tillage erosion — manure and
fertilizer injection and rowcrop tillage erode soil too.
“Root crop harvesting, like
potatoes, will cause as much
tillage erosion as all other
forms of tillage combined,”
Lobb said.
High and variable speeds
contribute to soil movement.
For example, equipment will
go faster downhill than up,
resulting in more soil going
down than up. To compens a t e, f a r m e r s n e e d e i t h e r
smaller tillage and seeding
equipment or bigger tractors,
or they have to slow down,
but no one wants to do that.
Flat fields erode too
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While gravity helps move soil
from hilltops to low areas, tillage erosion happens in flat
fields too. That’s why farmers
in the famously flat Red River
Valley keep having to clean out
their surface drains, Lobb said.
Farmers should select tillage equipment that incorporates a little bit of crop residue
and loosens the seedbed but
doesn’t go excessively deep.
Continued on next page »
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19
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Continued from previous page
Given that wind and water
don’t account for as much soil
erosion as earlier believed,
it raises questions about
how much crop residue is
necessary.
“S o - c a l l e d c o n s e r v a t i o n
tillage, such as chisel plowing, may not be very effective at protecting soil, particularly when you have other
practices that might actually
degrade it,” Lobb said. “And
so-called conservation tillage
systems may not actually protect water quality either.”
Lobb also questioned the
value of riparian zones (vegetated areas around waterways), which are promoted
to trap soil running off fields
and filter out nutrients. But
Lobb said not much soil is
washed from fields and riparian zones don’t filter nutrients because run-off usually
flows in small streams directly
through the riparian area into
the waterway.
“Water blows through those
systems,” he said. “They do
not filter. They cannot filter.
They are not effective.”
To b e e f f e c t i v e , r i p a r ian zones would have to be
wider and run-off would
have to soak into the ground.
Riparian vegetation would
also have to be harvested.
“Because if you just keep
putting nutrients into the vegetation and the vegetation is
bleeding all those nutrients
you’re not going to have any
positive effect in the long
run.” Lobb said. “You have to
remove the nutrients by harvesting the vegetation and
that’s something that people
who promote riparian areas
don’t want.”
Lobb is studying capturing
a farm’s run-off in a large dugout, then either using it for
irrigation or releasing it later
in the season. Not only could
nutrients and water be recycled, but the system could
mitigate flooding.
Another strategy is to
reduce run-off at the plant
level by making soil more
absorbent, Lobb said. That
requires getting more organic
matter and microbial activity in the soil, which comes
from producing healthy crops
and reduced tillage. It also
requires drainage to remove
excess water.
[email protected]
David Lobb (l) of the University of Manitoba, with master’s student Michelle Erb and Treherne-area farmer Dallas Timmerman in
November 2004 while working on a study into tillage-eroded soils and the efficacy of moving the eroded soil from low parts of
the field back to the hilltops. PHOTO: ALLAN DAWSON
briefs
Potential for
fewer flax acres
seen this year
BY DAVE SIMS
CNS Canada
While area seeded to
flax in Canada has been
increasing over the past
four years, that upward
momentum may halt in
2016-17.
Flax’s cost of production is higher than many
of its rivals and the growing lustre of pulse crops
could cut into some acres,
according to one industry
watcher.
“It’s too early to really
throw a number at it, but
right now my instincts are
it’s going to be down 10
per cent,” said Grant Fehr,
a senior merchandiser for
Scoular Special Crops at
Morden, Man.
T h i s c o n t ra s t s w i t h
Agriculture and Agri-Food
Canada’s recent prediction
that 1.73 million acres will
go in the ground during
2016-17.
Last year, 1.64 million acres were seeded to
flax in Canada, a slight
increase from the previous
year’s total of 1.59 million.
Fehr said another reason acres could be down
is the growing speculation
that peas and lentils are
going to be planted “big
time” in Saskatchewan.
Acres of canola and
wheat to be seeded will also
dictate flax acres, but at this
point, he said, it’s too early
to say how much wheat
and canola there will be.
“Our cost of production
shows (for flax) it’s pretty
much a wash, so it’s hard
to say where it’s going to
be at,” said Fehr.
In flax’s favour right
now, however, is its price.
“We’ve got a $12 new-crop
contract out there, which
is an attractive contract
for flax.”
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20
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Monsanto
versus
Schmeiser to
play out on
Winnipeg stage
A wintry sunburst
Prairie Theatre
Exchange will host
‘Seeds’ as part of its
latest tour
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Tawn
he tale of the Prairie
farmer who fought the
good fight for saved seed,
or tried and failed to game a
multinational agribusiness, or
maybe both — or neither, is
coming to the Winnipeg stage.
Seeds, written by playwright
Annabel Soutar, will run for
19 performances at Prairie
Theatre Exchange (PTE) in
Portage Place from Feb. 10 to
28, with Saskatchewan-born
actor Eric Peterson (“Corner
Gas,” “Street Legal”) as Percy
Schmeiser.
Seed and chemical company Monsanto successfully
s u e d S c h m e i s e r, a f a r m e r
and former mayor of Bruno,
Sask., for patent violation over
Roundup Ready canola in 2001.
That decision was upheld at
the Supreme Court of Canada
in 2004.
Soutar, in a release, said she
was “intrigued on so many
levels” when she first read of
the case in 2002, in part by
the roles of biotech and patents on genetically modified
organisms (GMOs) in Canadian
agriculture.
“But most of all I could tell
that there was a unique human
story here. Who was this Percy
Schmeiser and how had he
found the means to go toe to
toe in a legal battle against
one of the world’s biggest
corporations?”
“Seeds” is presented in a documentary style, based on court
transcripts and interviews with
the story’s major players. Soutar
is also a character in the story as
the Playwright, a move meant
to make the story more accessible to the audience and to show
the forces vying for influence
over her.
“This is a wonderful piece of
theatre that will certainly spark
a conversation about GMOs,
but more crucially, help inject
some critical thinking into that
conversation,” PTE artistic
director Bob Metcalfe said in
the same release.
“I think our patrons will
enter believing they know who
to champion, but by the end
of the night will have a fuller
appreciation for all sides.”
Winnipeg, the home base for
Monsanto Canada, will be the
longest stop on the play’s ninecity tour, presented by Montreal
theatre company Porte Parole,
where Soutar serves as artistic
director. The tour also makes
six stops in British Columbia
and one each in Saint John and
Fredericton, N.B.
Monsanto will also be the
show’s accommodation sponsor in Winnipeg. Porte Parole’s
tour is also mounted with support from Quebec agribusiness giant La Coop fédérée,
owner of the Elite and La Coop
seed and crop input retail
businesses and meat packer
Olymel.
Tickets and more information are available at www.pte.
mb.ca.
21
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Government should do more to
support agricultural science
Agriculture needs to respond to consumer demands for more information
BY ALEX BINKLEY
Co-operator contributor / Ottawa
T
Produced by: SeCan
Product/Campaign Name: SeCan AAC Brandon ‘ Wheat King
Date Produced: February 2016
Ad Number: SEC_BRANDON16_GOAL-T
Publication: Manitoba Cooperator
Size: 4Col x 140 (8.125” x 10”) Non Bleed
he global production
and demand for wheat
are rising in a lockstep
that leaves low carr y-over
stocks and an opportunity for
Canadian farmers to cash in,
says JoAnne Buth, CEO of the
Canadian International Grains
Institute.
Wheat is second only to
rice as a dietary staple and
shows no signs of losing its
consumer desirability, she
told the Canadian Agriculture
Economics Society Conference
in Ottawa last month. Since
1960, international wheat
consumption has risen from
about 250 million tonnes to
more than 700 million tonnes
per year.
Buth, a former senator and
head of the Canola Council
of Canada, said Cigi works
to make Canadian grains the
preferred choice among consumers around the world and
that there are steps government and industry can take to
advance that ambition.
One is to continue supporting
the Agriculture Canada value
chain roundtable, which brings
together farmers, processors,
food manufacturers and exporters to share ideas and information, she said. The sustainable agriculture roundtable also
needs increased backing, Buth
said.
The government also needs
to modernize the Food and
Drugs Act because many of its
provisions “are old and inhibit
entrepreneurs from introducing new products,” she said in
a later interview.
As well, it needs to rebuild
the agriculture science capability of the Canadian Food
Inspection Agency to clear
up a backlog of projects, continue funding for the AgriI n n ov a t i o n P r o g r a m a n d
t h e Ca n a d i a n A g r i c u l t u re
Adaptation Program, restore
agriculture as a priority area
under the National Science and
Engineering Research Council
and harmonize food regulations with key trading partners.
know that the labels promising
products meet certain standards are believable.
“Governments should play
a role in assuring the verification labels are trustworthy,”
she said.
At the same time, government and industry need to
conduct more research “to
gain a more nuanced understanding of consumer perceptions,” Hobbs said, adding that
governments need to facilitate
credible quality assurance
claims by industry, and help
industry gain access to international markets with programs such as traceability.
“They need to create an
environment that encourages
companies to invest to diversify and expand their prodCigi CEO JoAnne Buth
says Canada has an opportunity to sell more wheat. photo: Shannon vanraes
SEC_BRANDON16_GOAL-T_MC_SEC_BRANDON16_GOAL_T_MC.qxd
2016-02-01 2:48 PM Page 1
ucts,”
she added.
Respond to consumers
Jill Hobbs, a professor in the
department of agricultural and
resources economics at the
University of Saskatchewan,
said the food industry must
respond to “the increasing consumer interest in where their
food comes from, how it’s produced and what it makes different from competing products.”
Hobbs said consumers pay
attention to food’s origin, its
health benefits, the environmental footprint of its production, animal welfare and credible labelling. They want to
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22
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
T:10.25”
S:10.25”
Weather or Not
cropscience.bayer.ca/Raxil
1 888-283-6847
@Bayer4CropsCA
Always read and follow the label directions. Raxil® and Stress Shield® are registered trademarks of Bayer Global.
Bayer CropScience Inc. is a member of CropLife Canada.
C-55-02/16-10421660-E
Keeping volunteer canola out of soybeans
Inter-row tillage looks like a promising management tool
1
BCS10421660_RaxilPROShield_Above_104.indd
Insert Feb 11, 2016
1
100%
By Angela Lovell
Co-operator contributor
T
Bayer Crop Science
10421660
4:50 PM
he average of six per cent2-3-2016
canola
2-3-2016 4:50
seed loss during harvest sounds
badPM
Morrow,when
Marianne
(CAL-MCL)
enough, but even worse
con-
verted into the number of seeds left to
germinate as volunteers the following year.
“We’re losing an average of 4,000 to
5,000 seeds per square metre so it doesn’t
take a lot of persistence for volunteer
canola to be an issue,” Robert Gulden of
the department of plant science at the
University of Manitoba told the Manitoba
Agronomists Conference in December.
If soybean is the following crop, reducing the seed bank is critical because it’s
much less competitive than canola.
In studies covering 300 Prairie canola
fields over three years, Gulden and other
researchers have found that anything
which increases yield, such as fertility or
spraying for sclerotinia, reduced the proportional harvest losses.
Gulden said higher seeding rates also
help make soybeans more competitive
against volunteer canola and protect
yield.
“In one study we are looking at narrow
row spacing of 7.5 inches and a seeding
rate of 105 kilograms per hectare, targeting 180,000 plants per acre, which is
1.5 times higher than the recommended
seeding rate for soybeans,” Gulden said.
“We get higher yields with higher seeding rates, so plant numbers matter and
the soybeans were able to compete better
with the volunteer canola and pushed
down our seed return numbers.”
Management begins at seeding
Managing volunteers begins with seeding the canola. Gulden’s research shows
that harvesting earlier lowers seed losses
NEWSPAPER
None
Lynn.Skinner
None
None
None
Monica.VanEngelen
10.25” x 7.75”
10.25” x 7.75”
None
None
Production:Studio:Bayer:10..._RaxilPROShield_Above_104.indd
Helvetica Neue LT Std, Gotham
Manitoba Cooperator
----
Cyan,
Magenta,
Yellow,
Black
---
Average harvest loss in canola across the Prairies translates into 4,000 to 5,000 potential volunteers per square metre. Photo: Charles geddes
during harvest, and ensuring an earlier
harvest has a lot to do with plant density.
“When we seeded canola at 80 plants
per square metre and 20 plants per square
metre the heavier seeding rate matured
more evenly and led to earlier maturation
than the lower seeding rate,” Gulden said.
Slowing down the combine can also help
reduce losses. “The faster we drive the combine the greater the harvest losses,” he said.
Early-fall tillage
Because a lot of volunteer canola is also
herbicide resistant, it can be difficult to
control. Gulden has found that an early-fall
tillage pass is the best way to reduce the
canola seed bank.
“With zero till we saw very little fall seedling recruitment, but with an early fall
tillage pass, shortly after harvest, we can
encourage a number of volunteer canola
seedlings to emerge and in most winters
will be killed, and won’t be in the seed bank
the following spring,” Gulden said. “If we
wait to do a late-fall tillage the result looks
similar to zero till.”
He said in-season inter-row tillage
between wider row spacings may help deal
with volunteers. “We compared inter-row
mulches of wheat and fall rye between soybeans on 30-inch row spacings with interrow tillage. The mulches did not appear to
affect yield or the seed return very much,
but the inter-row tillage looks promising
from an integrated weed management perspective because it gave us higher soybean
yield and a lower volunteer canola seed
return,” Gulden said.
“Keeping in mind what’s happening with
glyphosate resistance in the U.S., I would
encourage anybody who is growing widerow soybean to use inter-row tillage as a
weed management tool, just to help avoid
some of those issues that are coming our
way.”
Heavy losses
Because volunteer canola is so competitive,
the action threshold in soybeans is low —
between 1.2 to 2.8 plants per square metre,
after which producers can expect to see a
five per cent yield loss.
Gulden and other researchers across
Western Canada are conducting studies
to see how effective herbicides are against
volunteer canola.
“There are a lot of herbicide options
available, and some work better than others
but the best choice depends very much on
the situation,” Gulden said.
He has found that timing of application to coincide with the critical weed-free
period is essential for herbicides to be most
effective.
“What’s important to preserve yield is
how quickly the herbicide works because
hitting the critical weed-free period is crucial to get good control,” Gulden said.
But the problem is no one knows yet
what the critical weed-free period for soybeans is in Manitoba.
“Group 2s take two to three weeks to
work, during which time the volunteer canola is still growing and still competing with
the slower-growing soybean. Products that
work very quickly and are applied when the
critical period starts may do a much better
job of preserving yield,” Gulden said.
“As little as soybean grows in our conditions during the month of June, our data
shows it is still very critical what happens in
that time frame in terms of forming yield.”
In Ontario production guides suggest
the critical weed-free period for soybeans
is the vegetative V1 to V3 growth stages, but
Gulden suspects in Western Canada it may
be much later.
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23
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
China cracks down on unapproved
GMOs ahead of Syngenta deal
Despite plans to buy a major crop biotech player, Beijing has no timeline to commercialize new GMOs
first time the local government had
taken such action, she said, but it is
not clear how effective such a move
will be.
BY DOMINIQUE PATTON
Beijing/Reuters
C
hinese officials have issued warnings to seed dealers and farmers not
to use unapproved genetically modified seeds in the country’s main Crop Belt,
shortly after Greenpeace said it had found
widespread GM contamination in corn.
The unprecedented action by rural
authorities in the past two weeks also
comes as state-owned ChemChina
agreed to a US$43-billion deal for seed
and crop chemicals giant Syngenta, a
move seen as bringing leading technology and know-how to China’s fragmented seed industry as it grapples with
a divisive GM policy.
China does not allow cultivation of
any GM varieties of corn or other staple
food crops although it does permit the
import of some GMO crops for use in
animal feed.
Despite Beijing’s strict official position
on the issue, Greenpeace last month said
almost all samples taken from cornfields
in some parts of the northeast, China’s
breadbasket, tested positive for GMO
contamination.
Beijing has not explicitly commented
on the Greenpeace findings, but local
authorities in Liaoning, Jilin and
Heilongjiang provinces issued notices
to farmers and seed companies warning
them ahead of the spring seed-buying
season against dealing in genetically
modified products.
Top producer
A farmer plants seeds in a cornfield at Gaocheng in China’s Hebei province on Sept. 30. Chinese seed
dealers and growers have been warned to steer clear of unapproved GM products. Photo: Reuters/Kim Kyung-Hoon
L i a o n i n g ’s s e e d m a n a g e m e n t Twitter-like Weibo and an official at the
bureau said any business or person bureau reached by phone said the notice
found engaging in illegal activity with was authentic.
A similar notice was received by a
fake or genetically modified seeds
would be “strictly investigated and farmer in Faku county in Liaoning,
said Greenpeace food and agriculture
prosecuted.”
B:10.25”
campaigner Zhang Jing. It was the
The notice was posted on China’s
As the world’s largest grain producer and
consumer, China places heavy strain on
its fragmented farm sector in order to
feed its nearly 1.4 billion people.
Years of intensive farming combined
with overuse of harsh chemicals has
degraded cropland and poisoned water
supplies, leaving the country increasingly vulnerable to crop shortages.
China’s crop-productivity gap is particularly evident in corn, where average
yields remain over 40 per cent below
those of the U.S. due to poorer seed
stock, smaller land parcels and ineffective pest management, according to
USDA.
Despite spending billions of dollars on
research into biotechnology, widespread
public opposition means Beijing has no
timeline for the commercialization of
new GMO crops.
The policy limbo has both frustrated a
handful of domestic biotech firms, and
led other seed companies to simply peddle unregistered GMO seeds to farmers
eager for solutions.
“We have heard that GMO corn is very
popular in the west of Liaoning and a
small area of west Jilin. Those areas are
traditionally infested by the Asian corn
borer,” a moth that can devastate crops,
said Liu Shi, a seed industry veteran.
T:10.25”
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and frost, the addition of Stress Shield® in
Raxil® PRO Shield helps provide superior
emergence, increased vigour and a healthier
plant resulting in a higher yield.
24
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
India in no hurry to clear GM foods
The country’s environment minister says government won’t stand in the way of science
BY MAYANK BHARDWAJ
New Delhi/Reuters
I
ndia needs more data before deciding
whether to permit commercial growing of its first genetically modified food
crop, its environment minister said Feb. 5,
but indicated it would not stand “in the way
of science” despite protests.
Prakash Javadekar said the evaluation
process would continue before the country
moves ahead with the use of a technology
that promises better farm yields but sharply
divides public opinion.
A committee of government and independent experts is seeking more information from a team of Indian scientists who
has spent almost a decade on laboratory
and field trials for a GM mustard crop.
“We will not rush through, but we will
also not come in the way of science,”
Javadekar told reporters. “We have to feed
more than a billion mouths and we have to
raise productivity… (but) we will not compromise on people’s health.”
The meeting, the third held to evaluate
field trial data on GM mustard this year,
had raised hopes among scientists that
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government is keen to push technology to lift food
productivity.
India spends billions of dollars every year
importing edible oils and other food items
to help offset abysmal food productivity
levels.
Farmers are stuck with old technology,
yields are at a fraction of global levels, cultivable land is shrinking and weather patterns have become less predictable.
Some farm economists have said India
should speed up efforts to embrace GM
foods after China took a giant leap toward
GM with its bid for Swiss transgenic seed
developer Syngenta.
But public and political opposition to
transgenic food remains strong amid fears
they could compromise food safety and
biodiversity.
About 200 placard-holding protesters shouted anti-GM slogans outside
Javadekar’s office earlier on Feb. 5.
Kapil Mishra, a minister in Delhi state
who met Javadekar, called it a win for those
resisting GM crops.
“(A) small victory but a long battle
ahead,” he said on Twitter.
India placed a moratorium on GM
An Indian scientist visits a patch of genetically modified rapeseed under trial in New Delhi on
February 13, 2015. Photo: Reuters/Anindito Mukherjee
aubergine in 2010, fearing the effect on
food safety and biodiversity. That effectively
brought the regulatory system to deadlock.
However, Prime Minister Narendra Modi,
who was instrumental in making Gujarat
state the leading user of GM cotton in India
when he was chief minister, cleared several
field trials soon after taking office in New
Delhi in 2014.
BMI Research said in a note that though
some Asian governments are becoming
more open to the idea of allowing GM food
cultivation, the adoption rate of GM crops
will remain slow.
briefs
Egypt sets tolerance
for ergot in wheat
Cairo/Reuters/Egypt’s
Agriculture Ministry will
allow wheat imports with
up to 0.05 per cent levels
of ergot, a common grains
fungus, it said on Feb. 3,
reversing a zero-tolerance
policy that prompted traders to boycott the state’s
wheat tender this week.
The Supply Ministry
and the General Authority
for Supply Commodities
(GASC) have baffled traders
in recent weeks by assuring
them their shipments would
be permitted with ergot
levels up to 0.05 per cent, a
common international standard, even as agricultural
authorities have rejected
shipments above zero.
“We go by the Egyptian
standards and the codex so
that means we accept up to
0.05 per cent,” Ministry of
Agriculture spokesman Eid
Hawash told Reuters.
Traders boycotted a state
tender on Tuesday after a
63,000-tonne French wheat
shipment was rejected by
GASC for containing traces
of ergot, despite the shipment meeting the 0.05
per cent threshold permitted by the authority’s
specifications.
Hawash said the French
vessel had not met the 0.05
standard and this was why
it was rejected, though
trade sources said the shipment was well below this
threshold.
The ministries of Supply
and Agriculture had recently
met and agreed to universally apply the 0.05 per cent
standard, Hawash said.
“There was a meeting
between the supply minister and agriculture minister
and they both agreed to
this… until there is a change
to the regulations we are
accepting 0.05,” he said.
Traders said they would
not be reassured until they
saw something official to
indicate the policy change.
STILL USING
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25
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
U.S. ethanol supplies rise to
near-record high
The Energy Information Administration cites a slowdown in demand
BY MICHAEL HIRTZER
“It’s very typical to have a pullback.”
Reuters
U
.S. ethanol prices fell
on Feb. 3 after the
Energy Information
Administration said stockpiles
jumped four per cent the previous week to the highest levels in
roughly four years, due to slowing demand.
Ethanol supplies rose 926,000
barrels to 22.36 million in the
week ended Jan. 29, the most
since the record-large stockpiles
seen in March of 2012, EIA data
showed.
The stocks build came despite
average production of the gasoline additive falling 2,000 barrels
per day to an average of 959,000
Jerod Kitt
ethanol analyst, The Linn Group
bpd, the lowest rates since
November.
“It’s residual weakness from
the East Coast storm,” said
Jerod Kitt, an ethanol analyst
at Chicago brokerage The Linn
Group. “It’s very typical to have a
pullback.”
The late-January storm was
one of the worst blizzards ever
to hit the U.S. East Coast, closing roads due to heavy snow
CONQUER™, BlackHawk®,
and ice, and limiting fuel
demand from drivers.
Ethanol supplies could soon
surpass the record of 22.713 million barrels from the week of
March 16, 2012, Kitt said. Spot
profit margins have improved
slightly in recent days, giving
some ethanol operators incentive to ramp up production at
facilities that have expanded
during the past few years.
U.S. farmers also increased
sales of corn during the past few
weeks, leaving ample supplies
for ethanol makers to grind.
“We stand a fair chance
of doing it by the end of the
month,” Kitt said of reaching
new record output.
Top ethanol producer Archer
Daniels Midland surprised
many in the industry on Feb. 2
when the company said it was
considering options, including a sale of its dry mill ethanol
plants, due to poor profitability.
An analyst at a publicly traded
ethanol maker said prices did
not decline further as supplies
were rising in the U.S. Gulf
Coast region, likely bound for
export markets — a small area
of growth for the industry.
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PHOTO: Glenbow Archives NC-6-3334
1.800.868.5444
2016-01-20 7:05 AM
Bayer
rejects
request
to pull
insecticide
from U.S.
The U.S. EPA seeks
a take-back on its
conditional registration
from 2008
BY KARL PLUME
Chicago/Reuters
T
he agricultural unit of
German chemicals company Bayer said Feb. 5 it
will fight a U.S. Environmental
P r o t e c t i o n A g e n c y ( E PA )
request to pull one of its insecticides from the marketplace
amid concerns that it could
harm organisms in streams and
ponds.
Bayer CropScience will instead
ask for an administrative law
hearing from the EPA’s Office of
General Counsel to review the
registration of flubendiamide, the
active ingredient in Bayer’s Belt
pesticide.
The registration, granted in
2008, was a limited-time conditional registration that could be
cancelled if additional studies
found the chemical to be damaging, the EPA said in a statement.
“EPA concluded that continued use of the product will result
in unreasonable adverse effects
on the environment,” the agency
said.
Flubendiamide products are
used to control yield-damaging
moths and worms in more than
200 crops including almonds,
oranges and soybeans.
Bayer’s own tests have found
that the pesticide is toxic in high
doses to invertebrates in river and
pond sediment. The organisms
can be an important food source
for fish.
However, the company’s field
studies showed that doses in
waters near agricultural fields
never reached high enough levels
to be toxic.
But the EPA’s risk assessment
disagreed so the agency sent
Bayer the request on Jan. 29.
“We are disappointed the EPA
places so much trust on computer
modelling and predictive capabilities when real-world monitoring shows no evidence of concern
after seven years of safe use,” said
Peter Coody, Bayer’s vice-president of environmental safety.
The EPA said after Bayer’s
refusal that it will issue a formal
request to cancel the pesticide’s
registration. After a comment
period mandated by U.S. pesticide regulation law, Bayer will ask
for a formal hearing to determine
the pesticide’s fate.
Belt will remain on the U.S.
market throughout the process.
No flubendiamide-based product is registered today in Canada,
though Health Canada is reviewing an application submitted last
July.
Bayer reported 471 million
euros (C$731.4 million) in insecticide sales globally in its most
recent quarter. The company
declined to provide sales details
of Belt.
The EPA’s move follows the
agency’s unsuccessful attempt to
withdraw its registration for Dow
Chemical’s Enlist Duo herbicide.
26
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Western Grain Research Foundation announces five
years of funding for AAFC wheat, barley breeding
The money will provide Agriculture Canada with stable funding despite changes in
wheat and barley checkoffs coming next year
BY ALLAN DAWSON
Co-operator staff
A
griculture and Agri-Food
Canada (AAFC) will get
steady funding for wheat
and barley breeding over the next
five years through the Western
Grains Research Foundation
(WGRF).
The WGRF is investing $21.4
million — $20 million and $1.4
million for wheat and barley,
respectively, up until 2020, it said
in a news release Feb. 8.
The money comes from the
Prairie-wide farmer checkoffs on
wheat and barley, which will end
July 31, 2017, to be replaced by
provincially based levies.
“We have enough of a reserve
built up in the wheat and barley
checkoffs to provide core funding for five years to Ag Canada
that we announced today,”
WGRF executive director Garth
Patterson said in an interview.
“We hope in the next week or two
to have announcements at the
three western Canadian universities that we’re also funding. Our
goal is to create stability in the
public wheat- and barley-breeding system out to 2020. That will
provide a cushion from when
the western Canadian deduction
ends in July next year.”
The funding has the full support of the wheat and barley
associations and commissions in
Western Canada, he added.
“It gives them time to get their
plans in place to assume responsibility (to fund plant breeding),”
Patterson said. “That’s the intent
— so there’s no cliff. Nobody has
to worry about support for public
research after July 31, 2017 when
the western checkoff ends.
“We have enough of a reserve built up in the
wheat and barley checkoffs to provide core
funding for five years to Ag Canada that we
announced today.”
Garth Patterson
“The whole key here is stability in public wheat and barley
breeding.”
The WGRF, established in 1994
through an endowment fund created from money left in a defunct
farm support program, will continue to support public research
on western crops after its current
checkoff ends, Patterson said.
The $120-million fund currently
earns four to five per cent a year
allowing the farmer-run WGRF
to invest $7 million to $8 million
annually,without depleting the
fund, he said.
“Checkoff investments of
over $90 million since 1994
have resulted in the development of 120 wheat and barley
varieties,” WGRF vice-chair
Keith Degenhardt, said in a
release. “Varieties like Lillian,
Strongfield, Carberry, and Unity
VB have offered not only higher
yields but improved end-use
properties, and better disease
and insect resistance compared
to those previously grown in
farmers’ fields.”
WGRF funding will also be
used to fight potentially devastating wheat and barley diseases, such as fusarium head
blight, enhance insect resistance, combat environmental
stresses such as drought and
flooding and develop genetic
markers for plant-breeding
selection.
“Wheat and barley contribute
billions of dollars annually to
Canada’s economy,” Agriculture
Minister Lawrence MacAulay
said in a release. “This substantial investment in wheat and
barley variety development
will advance innovation, giving Canadian grain farmers a
competitive edge to meet world
demands for food and feed.”
[email protected]
Cargill’s Black
River arm spins
off equity firm
Proterra’s investments,
are mainly in
developing countries
BY KARL PLUME
Chicago/Reuters
C
RANCONA PINNACLE TAKES SEED TREATMENT TECHNOLOGY TO NEW LEVELS.
®
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RANCONA micro-dispersion technology for superior adhesion and coverage. And when more active ingredient
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higher yields. To learn more, talk to your Arysta LifeScience representative or visit rancona.com.
Always read and follow label directions. Rancona is a registered trademark of MacDermid Agricultural Solutions, Inc.
Arysta LifeScience and the Arysta LifeScience logo are registered trademarks of the Arysta LifeScience Corporation. RANU-002
argill subsidiary Black
River Asset Management
announced on Jan. 25 the
spinoff of a private equity firm
focused on food, agriculture, mining and metals investments primarily in developing countries.
With more than $2.1 billion in assets under management, Minnesota-based Proterra
Investment Partners is one of
three independent companies
emerging from Black River after
Cargill announced its subsidiary’s
breakup in September (all figures
US$).
Cargill is in a restructuring aimed at transforming the
150-year-old company into one
more responsive to commodities
market swings. Losses stemming
from the liquidation of hedge
funds managed by Black River
dragged down Cargill profit in the
company’s most recent quarter.
Employee-owned Proterra said
it would retain all of its fund commitments and limited partners,
including Cargill.
Minneapolis-based Proterra
has $782 million in investments
in three food-focused funds, $1.2
billion in three agriculture-related
funds and $165 million in a metals
and mining fund, the company
said.
The firm has investments in
regions of Asia, Australia, subSaharan Africa and in South
America, said Ned Dau, Proterra’s
chief marketing officer and head
of investor relations.
“We think all of those areas
provide opportunities,” he said
in an interview. Dau added that
Proterra’s investments included
farmland development and management, shipping infrastructure
and companies focused on production and processing of foods
like meat and dairy.
Dau declined to elaborate on
the fund’s investment strategy.
27
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
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whether by negligence or otherwise.
(unless otherwise stated)
Advertising rAtes &
inForMAtion
REgulAR ClASSIfIED
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Address: ___________________________________________ Town: _____________________________________________
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advertisements appearing in its columns, exercises the greatest care in
an endeavor to restrict advertising to wholly reliable firms or individuals.
However, please do not send money to a Manitoba Co-operator box
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At Farm Business Communications we have a firm commitment to protecting your privacy and security as our customer. Farm Business Communications will only collect personal information if it is required for the proper
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Co-operator and Farm Business Communication assume no responsibility
for any actions or decisions taken by any reader for this publication based
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• Minimum charge — $11.25 per week for first 25 words
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28
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
AUCTION DISTRICTS
Parkland – North of Hwy 1; west of PR 242,
following the west shore of Lake Manitoba
and east shore of Lake Winnipegosis.
Westman – South of Hwy 1; west of PR 242.
Interlake – North of Hwy 1; east of PR 242,
following the west shore of Lake Manitoba
and east shore of Lake Winnipegosis.
Red River – South ofHwy 1; east of PR 242.
The Pas
AUCTION SALES
Manitoba Auctions – Westman
McSherry Auction Service Ltd
95 F SERIES SINGLE axles 24-ft. deck, 5.9 Cummins, A/C, hyd brakes, 169,000-mi, good condition,
asking $5,900. (204)871-2708 or (204)685-2124
Hit our readers where it counts… in the classifieds.
Place your ad in the Manitoba Co-operator classifed
section. 1-800-782-0794.
Tools & New Store Product!
BUILDING & RENOVATIONS
Doors & Windows
BUILDING & RENOVATIONS
Doors & Windows
Stonewall, MB - #12 Patterson Drive
Winnipegosis
Roblin
Dauphin
Grandview
Ashern
Gilbert Plains
Fisher Branch
Ste. Rose du Lac
Parkland
Birtle
Riverton
Eriksdale
McCreary
Langruth
Neepawa
Gladstone
Rapid City
Carberry
Killarney
Pilot Mound
Crystal City
Elm Creek
Sanford
Ste. Anne
Carman
Mariapolis
Lac du Bonnet
Beausejour
Winnipeg
Austin
Treherne
Westman
Boissevain
Stonewall
Selkirk
Portage
Brandon
Souris
Waskada
Interlake
Erickson
Minnedosa
Hamiota
1
Now Booking Spring
& Summer Sales
Gimli
Shoal Lake
Virden
Arborg
Lundar
St. Pierre
242
Morris
Winkler
Morden
Altona
Steinbach
Let us help you plan your
sale. For more info call:
Dave at 204-637-3393
Cell 204-856-6900
1
Red River
AUCTION SALES
Saskatchewan Auctions
[email protected]
www.nickelauctions.com
Truckload of New Product: Skid Steer
Blade * 3PH Rotary Tiller * 20’ x 30’ Storage
Shelter * 30’ x 65’ Storage Building * Com.
Tire Changer * 10’ 20 Drawer Work Bench
* 20’ Wrought Iron Driveway Gate * 50 Ton
Shop Press * Propane Space Heater * Fork
Extensions * ATV Winch * Insulated Tarps *
Welding Helmets & More * Hardware Close
Out – New Store Product & New Tools! Yard,
Antiques, Household * Go to Web!
Stuart McSherry
(204) 467-1858 or (204) 886-7027
www.mcsherryauction.com
Farming is enough of a gamble, advertise in the Manitoba Co-operator classified section. It’s a sure thing.
1-800-782-0794.
AUTO & TRANSPORT
MACK AUCTION CO presents a land auction for
the Estate of Ron Carriere Thurs., Mar 31st, 2016
7:00pm at the Days Inn Estevan, SK. Up for unreserved auction are 8 quarters sections of farmland
in the RM of Benson #35. Some of the will sell
w/surface lease oil revenue. Visit www.mackauctioncompany.com for sale bill & photos. (306)421-2928
or (306)487-7815 Mack Auction Co. PL 311962.
AUCTION SALES
U.S. Auctions
Get today’s
top ag news
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your inbox.
Sign up for daily enews at
manitobacooperator.ca
AUCTION SALES
U.S. Auctions
ADVANCE NOTICE:
Grand Forks Area
Equipment & Truck Auction
Indoors at the Alerus Center
March 23, 2 016
Capitalize on our proven track record and consign your no
longer needed items before spring planting!
Serving Manitoba, Saskatchewan,
NW Ontario & Alberta....Since 1937
AUTO & TRANSPORT
Auto & Truck Parts
TRUCK
& SUV
TRANSMISSION REPAIR
• Commercial
• Quick Turn Around
• Large Inventory of Factory
Fresh Transmissions
• Half Ton to Mid Range
• Custom Re-builds
• Differentials & Transfer Cases
• Quality Commercial/Agricultural/Residential
Overhead Doors & Operators.
• Aluminum Polycarbonate Doors Available.
• Non-Insulated and Insulated Sectional Doors Available.
• Liftmaster Heavy Duty Operators.
• Mullion Slide Away Centre Posts.
• Commercial/Agricultural Steel Man Doors and Frames.
• Your washbay door specialists. • Quality Installation & Service.
• 24 Hour Service. • Replacement Springs & Cables.
Phone: 204-326-4556 Fax: 204-326-5013
Toll Free: 1-855-326-4556
www.reimeroverheaddoors.com
email: [email protected]
Remember that story you wanted to
read again from a few months back?
Network
Springfield Rd. & Hwy. #59, Wpg.
(across from Star Builders)
SEARCH
Search news. Read stories. Find insight.
204-661-3983
AUCTION SALES
U.S. Auctions
AUCTION SALES
U.S. Auctions
AUCTION SALES
U.S. Auctions
Farm Retirement
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24 | 11AM
2016
Minitonas
Durban
Melita
AUTO & TRANSPORT
Trucks
Sat., Feb. 13th @ 10:00 am
Swan River
Reston
AUTO & TRANSPORT
Trucks
AUCTION SALE
Birch River
Russell
AUCTION SALES
Manitoba Auctions – Interlake
LOCATION: From Turtle Lake, ND, 2 miles south on Hwy. 41, 5 miles west on Hwy. 200 to Co. Rd 25E, 1 mile north, 1 mile east; or from Washburn, ND,
11 miles north on Hwy. 200A, 3 miles east on Hwy. 200 to Co. Rd. 25E, 1 mile north, 1 mile east. (1875 4th St NW, Turtle Lake, ND)
Not only have our Alerus Center Auctions been well attended, but
also well recognized for excellent results. We have sold millions
of dollars worth of equipment for hundreds of satisfied sellers &
to thousands of satisfied buyers throughout North America.
AUCTIONEER’S NOTE: Most equipment has been stored inside with an excellent maintenance program in place. Tractors, combines, planter & drill
have had JD Greenlight inspection program completed. Oils changed with analysis available. Major equipment begins selling at 11:00 AM. Live online
bidding available on major equipment. Registration, terms, & details at SteffesGroup.com
Save Thousands By Buying Outright
Using The Auction Method
To Liquidate Your Trades For Cash!!
ADVERTISING DEADLINE IS FEBRUARY 23!
Call 701-757-4015 For Proper Placement in All Promotions!
We Can Arrange Transportation And
Cleaning Of Your Equipment!
Dennis Biliske - 701-215-2058
Mark Jones - 701-317-0418
Travis Zablotney - 701-721-2188
Office
701-757-4015
2702 17th Avenue South,
Grand Forks, ND 58201
www.resourceauction.com
ATTENTION CANADIAN SELLERS
TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE CURRENT CURRENCY
EXCHANGE & TURN YOUR NO LONGER NEEDED
EQUIPMENT INTO WORKING CAPITAL AT OUR
NEARBY U.S. AUCTION MARCH 23!
TRACK & 4WD TRACTORS
loader, 6,266 hrs.,
2008 JD 9630T, deluxe cab, 5 hyd., 36"
S/N2310082U109671
tracks, 2,133 hrs.,
1967 JD 4020, JD 158 loader, 4,390
S/NRW9630T910243
hrs., loader S/NW00158X040718,
2006 Buhler Versatile 485, 4WD, 2,453 tractor S/N173315R
hrs., S/N700205
1959 JD 730, wide front, 1,932 hrs.
MFWD & 2WD TRACTORS
2012 JD 7230R, MFWD, IVT, JD H480
self-leveling quick tach loader, 1,945
hrs., S/N1RW7230PPBD004686
(18) JD front suitcase weights
1996 JD 8400, MFWD, Great Bend
quick tach self-leveling loader, 9,054
hrs., S/NRW8400P006167
(16) Front suitcase weights for JD
8000 Series tractor
1975 IHC 574 utility, 12 spd., hyd.
HARVEST EQUIPMENT
2009 JD 9770, STS,
S/NH09770S732836
2003 JD 9650W, Level Land,
S/NH09650W700532
2012 JD 608C non-chopping corn
head, 8x30”
2011 JD 635F flex head, fore/aft
2003 JD 930F flex head, 30’
2000 JD 930D draper head, 30’
1996 JD 914P pickup head
DAVE TWEETEN
1999 JD 925 straight head, SeedEater TILLAGE EQUIPMENT
SEMI TRACTOR
9” sunflower pans,
TRUCKS & TRAILERS
AIR SEEDER
SELF-PROPELLED SPRAYER
2013 JD 1895 air seeder, 43’, 10” & 20”
FERTILIZER EQUIPMENT
spacing, 6,383 acres, cart S/N750678,
NH3 TANKS
S/N750139
HAY & FORAGE EQUIPMENT
PLANTER
LIVESTOCK EQUIPMENT
2014 JD 1770NT planter, CCS, 16x30”, HOPPER BINS
variable rate, 2,228 acres, single
GRAIN HANDLING EQUIPMENT
owner
OTHER EQUIPMENT & ATVS
ATVS
GPS EQUIPMENT
SWATHERS & GRAIN CART
See complete terms, lot listings and
photos at SteffesGroup.com
701.220.6022 or 701.448.2632
or Brad Olstad of Steffes, 701.237.9173 or 701.238.0240
Steffes Group Inc., 2000 Main Avenue East, West Fargo, ND 58078
Brad Olstad ND319, Scott Steffes ND81, Bob Steffes ND82, Max Steffes ND999, Ashley Huhn ND843,
Eric Gabrielson ND890, Randy Kath ND894 | 701.237.9173 | SteffesGroup.com
TERMS: All items sold as is where is. Payment of cash or check must be made sale day before removal of items. Statements
made auction day take precedence over all advertising. $35 documentation fee applies to all titled vehicles. Titles will be
mailed. Canadian buyers need a bank letter of credit to facilitate border transfer.
29
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
BUILDING & RENOVATIONS
Roofing
FARM MACHINERY
HAYING & HARVESTING
PRICE TO CLEAR!!
FARM MACHINERY
Fertilizer Equipment
HAYING & HARVESTING
Various
USED DRY FERTILIZER SPREADERS, 4-8 tons,
large selection, 18-ft Drillfill, has extra brush auger,
$2,900.
www.zettlerfarmeuipment.com
Phone:
(204)857-8403.
FOR SALE: 1986 CIH 5000 swather 24.5-ft U2 PU
reel, poly skids, hole auger for canola, Dsl motor,
2-spd trans, cab & AC; 1994 CIH 8820 swather 25ft U2 PU reel, double swath, poly skid plates.
(204)724-4974.
75 truckloads 29 gauge full hard
100,000PSI high tensile roofing &
siding. 16 colours to choose from.
B-Gr. coloured......................70¢/ft.2
Multi-coloured millends.........49¢/ft.2
FARM MACHINERY
Grain Dryers
Also in stock low rib white 29 ga. ideal for
archrib buildings
BEAT THE PRICE
INCREASES CALL NOW
WESTERN GRAIN DRYER, manufacturers of
grain dryers w/fully automatic moisture & control
systems. Updates for all screenless dryers include,
roof, tiers & burner etc. Used dryers are available.
Toll-free 1-888-288-6857, westerngraindryer.com
FOUILLARD STEEL
SUPPLIES LTD.
FARM MACHINERY
Grain Vacuums
Ask about our blowout colours...65¢/ft.2
ST. LAZARE, MB.
1-800-510-3303
CURT’S GRAIN VAC SERVICES, parts & repair for
all makes & models. Craik SK, (306)734-2228.
BUILDINGS
FARM MACHINERY
Parts & Accessories
AFAB INDUSTRIES IS YOUR SUPERIOR post
frame building company. For estimates and information
call
1-888-816-AFAB(2322).
Website:
www.postframebuilding.com
CONCRETE FLATWORK: Specializing in place &
finish of concrete floors. Can accommodate any
floor design. References available. Alexander, MB.
204-752-2069.
Do you want to target Manitoba farmers? Place your
ad in the Manitoba Co-operator. Manitoba’s best-read
farm publication.
BUSINESS SERVICES
MURPHY SALVAGE New & used parts for tractors,
combines, swathers, square & round balers, tillage,
press drills & other misc machinery. MURPHY SALVAGE (204)858-2727 or toll free 1-877-858-2728.
PARTING OUT AC 7060; White 2-155; Cockshutt
1250, 550, 560, 40; Case 800, 830, 900, 930, 1270;
Kubota 120, 135; JD 7700 combine; Soft core balers; NH 116 & 495 haybines; various older Implement tires & rims, hyd components. (204)871-2708
or (204)685-2124
FYFE PARTS
FARM CHEMICAL / SEED COMPLAINTS
1-800-667-9871 •• Regina
1-800-667-9871
Regina
1-800-667-3095 •• Saskatoon
1-800-667-3095
Saskatoon
1-800-387-2768 • Winnipeg
1-800-667-3095
Manitoba
1-800-222-6594 •• Edmonton
We also specialize in: agricultural complaints
of any nature; Crop ins. appeals; Spray drift;
Chemical failure; Residual herbicide;
Custom operator issues; Equip. malfunctions.
Licensed Agrologist on Staff.
For assistance and compensation call
“For All Your Farm Parts”
www.fyfeparts.com
Call our toll-free number to take advantage of our Prepayment Bonus. Prepay for 3 weeks and we’ll run your
ad 2 more weeks for free. That’s 5 weeks for the price
of 3. Call 1-800-782-0794 today!
Back-Track InvesTIgaTIons
1-866-882-4779. www.backtrackcanada.com
Looking for a hand around the farm? Place a help
wanted ad in the classifieds. Call 1-800-782-0794.
CONSTRUCTION EQUIPMENT
6 QUICK ATTACH EXCAVATOR buckets, some
trenching & clean-up buckets, plus 6 excavator rippers, some Cat’s & WBM’s. (204)871-0925, MacGregor MB.
2007 D-6-N LGP CRAWLER w/6-way dozer, A/C,
cab, canopy, diff-steering, ripper, extra clean,
$96,000; 2004 D-6-N LGP crawler, 6-way dozer,
A/C, cab, diff-steering, Allied W6D winch, $86,000;
2003 D-7-R, cab, a/c plus bush canopy, 4-barrel
multi-ripper w/a dozer & hyd tilt, new engine plus
repairs, total work order $137,000 3,000-hrs ago,
$105,000 USD; 2008 Hitachi ZX-270-C-3 hyd excavator w/hyd thumb, w/quick attach bucket,
7,190-hrs, $70,000 USD; 2006 Hitachi ZX 270-LC
Hyd excavator w/quick attach bucket, 11-ft stick,
axillary hyd, 6,382-hrs, $65,000 USD. (2) 2005 Komatsu 320 payloaders w/quick attach buckets,
$50,000/each; 2010 CAT 324 excavator w/electronic thumb. Phone:(204)871-0925.
Combines
COMBINES
Accessories
AGCO MF CAT flex platforms: In stock Models 500
Gleaner 25-ft. & 30-ft.; Model 8000 30-ft. & 8200
35-ft. MF; Cat FD30 flex; FD40 flex. Reconditioned,
ready to go. Delivery in SK, MB, AB. Gary:
(204)326-7000, Reimer Farm Equip, Hwy #12 N,
Steinbach, MB. www.reimerfarmequipment.com
CASE/IH FLEX PLATFORMS: MODELS 1020 25ft. & 30-ft. w/wo sir reel; 2020 30-ft. & 35-ft., 2020
30-ft. w/air reel; 2011 3020 35-ft. Can install new
AWS air bar for additional $11,500. Deliver in SK,
MB, AB. Gary (204)326-7000, Reimer Farm Equip,
Hwy #12 N, www.reimerfarmequipment.com Steinbach, MB.
GOODS USED TRACTOR PARTS: (204)564-2528
or 1-877-564-8734, Roblin, MB.
Stretch your advertising dollars! Place an ad in the
classifieds. Our friendly staff is waiting for your call.
1-800-782-0794.
BUSINESS SERVICES
Crop Consulting
FOR SALE: LARGE ROUND brome & alfalfa mix
hay bales, $65, can deliver. Phone (204)324-9300.
The Real Used FaRm PaRTs
sUPeRsToRe
Over 2700 Units for Salvage
• TRACTORS • COMBINES
• SWATHERS • DISCERS
Call Joe, leN oR daRWIN
(306) 946-2222
monday-Friday - 8 a.m. - 5 p.m.
WATROUS SALVAGE
WaTRoUs, sK.
Fax: 306-946-2444
FARM MACHINERY
Machinery Miscellaneous
1999 Agri Fab Great used mixer! This is one of the
heaviest mixers we’ve ever seen. Four augers offering a great mix front to back top to bottom. 3/4-in
flighting & heavy side walls. New 48-in conveyor. All
parts are common & available at any bearing store.
$12,999.99 (306)971-9006
8820 JD COMBINE; 4555 JD tractor, FWA w/front
end & grapple; 1086 Int tractor w/front end & grapple; 32-ft Ezee-on air seeder w/1400-gal fertilizer
caddy; 40-ft harrow packer; Melroe 5 bottom plow;
4490 Case tractor; 54-ft Friggstad deep tiller; 20-ft
Case Int 50000 sp swather w/cab, heat & AE w/U2
PU reel; 140-bu grain dryer; Rock-matic stone picker & 12-ft stone rake; 62-ft spray air 12-in swing out
auger; 10,000-gal., 2)5000-gal, 2)3000-gal &
1)1700-gal liquid fertilizer tanks; various size grain
bins; 120-ft Flexi-coil sprayer; 2-ton Ford grain truck
w/roll tarp; 4-wheel 2 axle swather carrier; 20-ft
deep tiller; 20-ft cultivator. Call (204)744-2491 or
(204)825-8616.
ARTSWAY MIXMILL, $1,500; HENKE 30-in. PTO
rollermill, $3,500; Peerless 20 rollermill, $2,000;
Bearcat grinder, $800; NH LX865 skidsteer,
$13,900; New skidsteer 48-in. forks walk through
$950; Valmar 1620, $2,500; 3255, $3,500; 2420
trailer type, $5,000; JD 7000 8RN planter, $7,000;
REM 2500 HD grain vac, $9,500; Brandt 4000,
$8,000; Brandt 4500, $8,500; REM 1026, $4,500;
New 10-ft. box scraper, $2,450. (204)857-8403
FOR SALE: 37-FT LAURIER land packer; 36-ft
IHC #45 cultivator w/harrows; Case 414 plow. All
machinery in good shape. Phone:(204)745-2784.
GRAVITY WAGONS- NEW 400-BU., $7,400; 600bu., $12,500. Large selection of used gravity wagons 200-750 bu, $2,000 up. Large selection of used
grain carts 495-1050 bu. Brent 610, $10,000; UFT
750 hyd dr, $17,500; MW 620-bu. $13,500; Used
dry fertilize spreaders 4-8 Ton; Gehl 500-bu. 4 auger feed cart, $10,000; Roorda feeder cart, $2,000;
JD 780 spreader hydra push, $10,000; Gehl 1315
slinger, $5,000. (204)857-8403.
MCKEE 7-FT SNOW BLOWER, $1,250; Leon 12-ft
blade, $3,500, 10-ft blade, $2,000; Box scraper new
10-ft, $2,450; New Holland LX865 skidsteer,
$13,900; Melroe Bobcat 943 skidsteer, $14,900;
Grapple bucket for skidsteer new, $1,750; Grain
screeners dual screen Hutchinson, $1,500; Up
DMC 44, $2,500; Kwik Kleen 5 tube, $5,000, 7
tube, $6,500; Kelly Ryan Feedcart, $2,000; Snowco
feeder cart, $1,000. www.zettlerfarmequipment.com
Phone:(204)857-8403.
Do you want to target Manitoba farmers? Place your
ad in the Manitoba Co-operator. Manitoba’s best-read
farm publication.
FARM MACHINERY
Machinery Wanted
FLEX HEADER TO FIT Massey 750 combine.
Phone Bill (204)770-4706.
Watch your
profits grow!
Prepayment Bonus
Prepay your regular word classified ad for
3 weeks and your ad will run an additional
2 consecutive weeks for free!
Call Our Customer Service Representatives
To Place Your Ad Today!
Outside Winnipeg: 1-800-782-0794
Winnipeg: 954-1415
JD FLEX PLATFORMS: 922, 925, 930, sever- al
newer ones w/full finger augers & air reels; 630-635
w/wo air bars. Deliver in SK, MB, AB. Gary
(204)326-7000, Reimer Farm Equipment, Hwy #12
N, Steinbach, MB. www.reimerfarmequipment.com
NH FLEX PLATFORMS: In stock Models 973 both
25-30’; 74C 30-ft. w/air reel; 88C 36-ft. flex draper;
94C 25-ft. rigid draper w/trailer. Deliver in SK, MB,
AB. Gary (204)326-7000, Reimer Farm Equip, Hwy
#12 N, www.reimerfarmequipment.com Steinbach, MB.
1-800-782-0794
FREE STANDING CORRAL PANELS, Feeders &
Alley ways, 30ft or order to size. Oil Field Pipe: 1.3,
1.6, 1.9, 1 7/8, 2-in, 2 3/8, 2 7/8, 3 1/2. Sucker Rod:
3/4, 7/8, 1. Casing Pipes: 4-9inch. Sold by the piece
or semi load lots. For special pricing call Art
(204)685-2628 or cell (204)856-3440.
LIVESTOCK
LIVESTOCK
Cattle Auctions
IN PURSUIT OF PERFECTION BULL SALE,
March 10th, 1:00PM, at Spring Creek Ranch, Moosomin, SK. Offering 100 Red & Black Simmental,
Red & Black Angus, & Black Best of Beef bulls. Volume & loyalty customer discounts. For more info or
a
catalogue
contact
Brian
McCarthy
at
(306)435-3590
or
T
Bar
C
Cattle
Co.
(306)220-5006. Watch & bid online at www.liveauctions.tv View catalogue online at www.buyagro.com
(PL #116061)
Hwy #205, Grunthal • (204) 434-6519
GRUNTHAL, MB.
AGENT FOR T.E.A.M. MARKETING
REGULAR
CATTLE SALES
every TUESDAY at 9 am
February 16th & 23rd
Saturday, February 20th at 10 am
Bred Cow Sale
Monday, February 29th at 12 pm
Sheep and Goat with
Small Animals & Holstein Calves
For on farm appraisal of livestock
or for marketing information please call
Harold Unrau (Manager) Cell 871 0250
Auction Mart (204) 434-6519
MB. Livestock Dealer #1111
WWW.GRUNTHALLIVESTOCK.COM
HEADER TRAILERS & ACCESSORIES.
Arc-Fab Industries. 204-355-9595
[email protected] www.arcfab.ca
Tillage & Seeding
TILLAGE & SEEDING
Seeding Various
CERTIFIED CONVENTIONAL CM440 GRAZING
CORN. Early maturing, leafier for increased grazing
yield. No planter required. Swath or stand graze
cattle, sheep, bison & for wildlife food plots. CanaMaize Seed Inc., 1-877-262-4046, www.canamaize.com
GLY 1 SOYBEAN SEED. Early, mid, long season
available. Top yields. Bulk or bagged. Keep your
own seed, with the convenience of glyphosate! No
contracts or TUAs. Dealers wanted. Call or text
Matt: (204)280-0568 or Nate: (204)280-1202
TILLAGE & SEEDING
Tillage Various
FOR SALE: 1985 IHC 7200 hoe press drill ,always
shedded, very clean. For more info phone evenings
(204)859-2724
TracTors
TRACTORS
Case/IH
1988 CASE IH 7130 MFD 7,058-hrs, rebuilt engine
no hrs, 20.8x38 tires 50%, 3 hyd, 1,000 PTO,
$33,500. Phone (306)542-3037.
TRACTORS
Massey Ferguson
ANGUS INFLUENCE SALE
Friday, February 12, 2016
SHEEP LAMB AND GOAT SALE
Wed., Feb. 17, 2016 @ 1:00 p.m.
SPECIAL HOLSTEIN STEER SALE
Fri., Feb. 19, 2016 @ 9:00 a.m.
BRED COW SALE
Mon., Feb. 22, 2016 @ 10:30 a.m.
• 25 Char Cows Bred Charolais,
3rd, 4th And 5th Calvers
(Butcher And Feeder
Sale @ 9:00 a.m.)
SPECIAL REPLACEMENT
HEIFER SALE
Friday, February 26, 2016
- Sell In Groups Of 5 to 10 • 25 BWF Brackle Heifers
• 50 Black And Black X Heifers
• 50 Red And Red X Heifers
(Phone To Consign)
REGULAR BUTCHER AND FEEDER
SALE EVERY FRIDAY
We Have 5 to 7 Cow Buyers 6 to 7 Feeder Buyers 3 to 5 Local Buyers
“Where Buyers & Sellers Meet”
To Consign or for more information call:
204-694-8328 or call Mike at 204-807-0747
www.winnipeglivestocksales.com
Licence #1122
MF 1085 CAB HEATER 3-PTH, good tires, new
hyd pump, FEL avail, $10,850. Consider offers or
trades. (204)871-2708 or (204)685-2124
TRACTORS
Versatile
875 VERS. W/ATOM JET & good tires. Nice shape.
Ph:(204)325-2416.
TRACTORS
2-Wheel Drive
STEVE’S TRACTOR REBUILDER specializing in
JD tractors in need of repair or burnt, or will buy for
parts. JD parts available. Phone: 204-466-2927 or
cell: 204-871-5170, Austin.
TRACTORS
4-Wheel Drive
FOR SALE: JD 8970 Cummins 400-HP, 24-spd, 5
remote, 710-38 tires, 7100-hrs, clean, shedded.
$68,000. Phone: (204)324-9300
TRACTORS
Various
MASSEY HARRIS 44 TRACTOR w/loader, very
good motor, no problem to start at 25 below. Phone
Evenings (204)655-3308.
HEAT & AIR CONDITIONING
The Icynene Insulation
System®
Manitoba’s best-read farm publication
IRON & STEEL
• Sprayed foam insulation
• Ideal for shops, barns or homes
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Energy Efficient®
www.penta.ca
1-800-587-4711
Get market and
commodities
numbers from
today… now.
Download the app at
agreader.ca/mbc
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Angus
55 RED AND BLACK Angus Two-Year Old Bulls
Suitable for Heifers and Cows. Private Treaty @ the
Ranch Info sheets available. Triple V Ranch Dan
(204)665-2448
or
(204)522-0092,
Matthew
(204)264-0706 Website vvvranch.com
F BAR & ASSOCIATES Angus bulls for sale.
Choose from 20 two-yr-old and yearling Red and
Black Angus bulls. Great genetics, easy-handling,
semen-tested, delivery available. Call for sales list.
Inquiries and visitors are welcome. We are located
in Eddystone, about 20-mi E of Ste. Rose, or 25-mi
W of Lake MB Narrows, just off Hwy 68. Call Allen
& Merilyn Staheli. Tel: (204)448-2124 Email: [email protected]
HORNER CATTLE COMPANY HAS for sale approx 50 top quality home-raised angus cross cimmental bred heifers. Exposed to easy calving, red
and black angus bulls, from June 15-Sept 15. Heifers are from established herd with proven performance in the progeny and long-standing comprehensive health program. Call Alan (204)867-7117
or (204)867-2087 or [email protected].
RED ANGUS PUREBRED LONG yearling & two
year old bulls for sale. Contact DBM Angus Farms
at Holland, MB: Brian:(204)723-0474 or David:
(204)723-0288.
30
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Crosswor
ossword
Cr
osswor
d
Horticultural Horrors!
by Adrian Powell
4
5
6
7
17
34
51
52
53
38
41
43
44
48
47
50
57
Scottish body of water
US milk purchase
"Battle Cry" novelist
Built
Honkers in a gaggle
Sicilian seaport
Raise dough?
Vineyard fruits
Piece for a sitar
Caesar concoction
Refrain syllables
Stitch again
Man of the cloth, briefly
Major Hoople utterance
Drug smuggler
Big Cold War initials
Topaz, e.g.
'61 Hayward/Martin drama
Irish aviation prefix
SOLUTION TO PUZZLE
O
N
T
O
DOWN
1 Shout to a dog team
2 Not taken in by
3 You're looking at one
4 Box office success
5 Embassy junior
6 Actress Paige of "Chess" and
"Cats"
7 Queen of Hearts' speciality
8 Undesired picnic visitor
9 Hawaiian shirt go-with
10 On the waterfront
11 Just inches away
12 Manufacturer
13 Night stand jugs
18 Amorphous mass
19 Garlic section
23 It's on the agenda
24 Uproars
25 Dutch engineering construction
26 Appease to the max
27 Wavy, graceful moulding
28 It flows along the Asia-Europe
border
29 Velcro material
32 Tiny skirt
33 Three-petalled bloom
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51
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M
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Perimeter
Breakfast and lunch
Dracula's bedtime
Planet where Olympus Mons lies
Waiter's jotting
L
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I C
L
D O
I V
K E
E
63
C H A
L I T
U T T
E
A
I C
U T H
R E E
A M
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A C M E
S L A W
H O K E
O S E R
R E R S
E
M I L
M I R O
A N I C
D I S H
E
E M U
A G U S
E A L S
R D E R
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55
E T A
L A N
G A R T
L I T
O N
A
B E N D
Y O
P U L S
I R O
N I N G
T S
R
M A
G A S P
E D G E
M A R S
54
G
E
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S
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*Taxes included
33
L
E
A
V
E
N
ATTACH YOUR MAILING LABEL HERE
❑ 1 Year: $150.00
(US Funds)
37
40
ACROSS
1 Chocolate flavoured coffee
6 Bibliographical abbr.
10 Peak
14 Not illuminated
15 London's Petticoat ___
16 Shredded cabbage creation
17 Veggie developed in
Baden-Wurttemberg, maybe?
20 Basic garden tool
21 Came down
22 Unsuccessful one
23 Mouse's target?
24 Huge fans
26 Curly-leafed veggie they
eat in Indiana?
30 Jibe
31 Ox harness
32 Wire thickness measure
35 Toronto Raptors, e.g.
36 Pea, bean or lentil
38 Barcelona surrealist Joan ___
39 Something in a sushi roll
40 Helicopter's ancestor
41 Lose one's composure
42 Old Saint Petersburg root veggie?
45 They're found on city maps
48 Bad lung sound
49 Localities
50 Wizard, archaically
51 Rhea's relative
54 Veggie originally grown in Nevada?
58 Anchored behind the jetty, maybe
Your expiry
date is located
on your
publication's
mailing label.
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❑ 3 Years $134.00*
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49
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Call, email or mail us today!
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Last week's answer
5
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8
4 2
7 4
6 5 8
7 3
3
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1
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1
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____________
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____________
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____________
4. Canola
____________
5. Flax
____________
6. Durum
____________
7. Rye
____________
8. Peas
____________
9. Chick Peas
____________
Livestock Enterpise No. of head
1. Registered Beef ____________
2. Commercial Cow ____________
3. Fed Cattle (sold yearly) ____________
4. Hog Weaners (sold yearly) __________
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1 through 9 must fill each row, column and box. Each number can appear only once in each row, column and box. You
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31
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
OSSAWA ANGUS AT MARQUETTE, MB has for
sale: Yearling & 2-yr old bulls. For more info call
(204)375-6658, cell (204)383-0703.
STEWART CATTLE CO. & GUESTS BULL SALE
Feb 25, 2016 at 1:30PM Neepawa Ag-plex, Neepawa, MB. 50 Black Angus bulls & Simm/Angus
bulls. Contact Brent Stewart (204)773-2356 home,
(204)773-6392 cell. View catalogue at www.stewartcattle.com. Email: [email protected]
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Charolais
CHAROLAIS BULLS 1& 2 yr olds. Vaccinated and
tested. Steppler and HTA genetics. Call or text
(204)381-1240.
FOR SALE: COMING 2 yr old Charolais bulls,
grandsons of Bluegrass. Will be easy calving, good
dispositions & guaranteed. K.E.H Charolais phone
Keith Hagan (204)748-1024, Virden.
PUREBRED CHAROLAIS BULLS, 1 1/2-yr olds &
yearlings, White & Red factor, some good for heifers, semen tested in spring, guaranteed & delivered. R&G McDonald Livestock. (204)466-2883,
(204)724-2811.
PUREBRED CHAROLAIS YEARLINGS & three
2-yr old bulls for sale by private treaty, White & Red
factor. Phone Brad (204)523-0062 www.clinecattlecompany.ca
SEED / FEED / GRAIN
LIVESTOCK EQUIPMENT
KELLN SOLAR SUMMER/WINTER WATERING
System, provides water in remote areas, improves
water quality, increases pasture productivity, extends
dugout
life.
St.
Claude/Portage,
204-379-2763.
MISCELLANEOUS
FOR SALE
650 WATT PENCIL BLOCK heaters, also D02 various, new Armatures (older tractors.) Sheep equip,
200 gal. troughs, Ritchie cattle fountain, & rolls A-W
Lumex for flock “Night Radios”, one lamb scale &
few floating trough heaters. Will build floating trough
heaters. Will build lamb creep, special design gate,
$100. For Info Ph: (204)822-3649, Morden MB.
ORGANIC
ORGANIC
Organic – Certified
ORGANIC
Organic – Grains
FOR SALE: 15 ANGUS Hereford X Heifer Calves,
will make excellent cows. Call Don Guilford, Hereford Ranch (204)873-2430, Clearwater.
GROW ORGANIC QUINOA! Total production contracts
available.
Visit:
www.quinoa.com
or
Phone:(306)933-9525.
FOR SALE: POLLED HEREFORD Bulls Yearlings
& Long Yearlings, semen tested & performance
records avail. Call Don Guilford, Hereford Ranch
(204)873-2430, Clearwater.
PERSONAL
PUREBRED YEARLING BULLS FOR sale, all are
polled, thick & easy fleshing w/moderate to low
birthweights. We also have 3 bulls at the Douglas
Bull Development Centre selling on April 2nd 2016.
Call
Uphill
Shorthorns
(204)764-2663,
cell
(204)365-7155 [email protected]
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Simmental
PIZZEY SIMMENTALS IS SELLING on the farm
yearling Simmental Bulls Red & Black & Traditional,
moderate birth weights. Call Calvin (204)847-2055.
WE HAVE AN EXCELLENT group of polled yearling Simmental bulls. Your bull comes with a full
guarantee, is semen tested, fed, insured until delivered (No later than June 1st), and delivered (Within
MB.) when you need him, all at our cost. Call Ray
Cormier at (204)736-2608 and you can also visit
our website at www.riverbankfarms.com All bulls
are sold out of the yard by private treaty.
LIVESTOCK
Cattle Various
500 BRED HEIFERS. Reds, Blacks, Silvers &
Tans. Start calving March 25th, 2016. Had all shots,
preg checked, Ivomec, pelvic measured, weigh approx 1250-lbs. Phone:(204)325-2416.
FOR SALE: 40 GOOD Charolais cross cows, bred
Charolais, due to start calving March 1st. Phone
(204)447-0184 or (204)447-2756.
HORNER CATTLE COMPANY HAS for sale
group of 25 angus cross cimmental bred cows. Age
3-8yrs. Preg checked to angus and cimmental bulls.
Calving in May/June. Call (204)867-2087 or
(204)867-7117. [email protected].
LIVESTOCK
Cattle Wanted
TIRED OF THE
HIGH COST OF
MARKETING
YOUR CALVES??
300-700 LBS.
Steers & Heifers
Rob: 528-3254, 724-3400
Ben: 721-3400
800-1000 LBS.
Steers & Heifers
Don: 528-3477, 729-7240
Contact:
D.J. (Don) MacDonald
Livestock Ltd.
License #1110
1ST & 2ND CUT Alfalfa, Timothy, 5x6 round bales,
have some w/70% alfalfa & some w/30% alfalfa. No
rain,
1,400-lbs.
Phone:
(204)661-1091
or
(204)427-2601.
5X6-FT HARDCORE ALFALFA BROME grass
round bales for sale, 1500-lbs. Good quality & large
quantity. First & second-cut. Feed test available.
Price
negotiable. Loading
available. Phone
(204)967-2247
Kelwood,
MB
or
Cell
(204)212-0751.
AN ASSORTMENT OF CREEP feeders & self
feeders on wheels & skids. All Cypress Industries.
Phone:(204)325-2416.
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Hereford
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Shorthorn
SEED/FEED/GRAIN
Hay & Straw
ALTERNATIVE POWER BY SUNDOG SOLAR,
portable/remote solar water pumping for winter/summer. Call for pricing on solar systems, wind
generators, aeration. Service & repair on all
makes/models. Carl Driedger, (204)556-2346 or
(204)851-0145, Virden.
WANT THE ORGANIC ADVANTAGE? Contact an
organic Agrologist at Pro-Cert for information on organic farming: prospects, transition, barriers, benefits, certification & marketing. Call:(306)382-1299,
Saskatoon, SK or at [email protected]
POLLED RED & BLACK BULLS quiet, guaranteed,
semen tested, delivery available. Performance &
pedigree information www.cherwaylimousin.ca
Yearlings & 2 Year olds. (204)736-2878
[email protected]
SAINFOIN SEED FOR SALE. Nutritious, bloat-free,
perennial forage loved by all animals and honeybees. Research from Utah University indicates better meat flavor and nutrition from sainfoin supplemented forage. Prime Sainfoin is certified organic.
www.primegrains.com
Ph:(306)739-2900
[email protected].
P. QUINTAINE & SON LTD.
728-7549
Licence No. 1123
WE HAVE AN EXCELLENT selection of PB Charolais bulls, both Red & white yearling & 2-yr olds.
Pictures & info on the net www.defoortstockfarm.com. Call Gord or Sue:(204)743-2109.
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Limousin
FOR SALE: ALFALFA, TIMOTHY, Brome, Clover,
hay & pasture blends, millet seed, Crown, Red Prozo. Leonard Friesen (204)685-2376, Austin, MB.
MANITOBA MAN LOOKING FOR lady 60-71 years
for friendship & companionship, to go for dances &
coffee, Photo Please. Reply to Ad# 1027, c/o Manitoba Co-operator, Box 9800, Station Main, Winnipeg, MB R3C 3K7
TIME TO APPRECIATE RELATIONSHIPS... Life is
Meant to be Shared. We are Here to Help You.
CANDLELIGHT
MATCHMAKERS.
Confidential,
Rural, Photos and Profiles to selected matches, Affordable, Local. Serving MB, SK, NW-Ontario.
Call/Write for info: Box 212, Roland, MB, R0G 1T0,
www.candlelightmatchmakers.ca (204)343-2475.
REAL ESTATE
REAL ESTATE
Houses & Lots
NOTRE DAME USED OIL
READY TO MOVE 3-BDRM home. Just completed.
Stunning white
shaker kitchen.
See photos on web& FILTER
DEPOT
site. MARVIN HOMES, Marvin Vogt, Mitchell, MB.
• Buy Used Oil or (204)355-8484.
• Buy Batterieswww.marvin(204)326-1493
homes.ca
• Collect Used Filters • Collect Oil Containers
Southern
and Western
Manitoba
REAL
ESTATE
Land
For Rent
Tel:
204-248-2110
LOOKING TO RENT IN Stonewall, Teulon, Warren
& Rosser area. Phone (204)513-0332.
REAL ESTATE
Land For Sale
JOHN DIDYCHUK OF TOUTES Aides & the estate
of Laurence Didychuk of Rorketon, MB intend to
sell private lands: NE7-29-14W, W1/2 7-29-14W,
E1/2 32-28-15W, NE31-28-15W, NW9-29-14W,
SW17-29-14W, SE9-29-14W to Clayton Breault,
Jesse Breault & Dwain Breault who will be considered by Manitoba Agriculture, Food & Rural Development for possible transfer of the Crown land forage lease associated with this ranch unit. This
forage lease currently consists of the following:
NW27-28-14W, S1/2 27-28-14W, E1/2 28-28-14W,
NW06-29-14W, SE07-29-14W, W1/2 28-28-14W,
E1/2
32-28-14W,
W1/2
33-28-14W,
W1/2
04-29-14W, NE09-29-14W, SW09-29-14, W1/2
18-29-14W,
SE18-29-14W,
SE34-28-15W,
SW35-28-15W,
NE27-28-14W,
SE33-28-14W,
SW34-28-14W, NE04-29-14W, E1/2 05-29-14W,
SE 08-29-14W, E1/2 19-29-14W, W1/2 20-29-14W,
W1/2 29-29-14W by unit transfer. If you wish to
comment on or object to the potential transfer of
this forage lease to this purchaser, please write to:
Director, MAFRD, Agricultural Crown Lands, PO
Box 1286, Minnedosa MB, R0J 1E0; or
Fax:(204)867-6578.
REAL ESTATE
Farms & Ranches – Acreages/Hobby
FARM SALES: GRANT TWEED specializing in farm
property. If you plan to sell, buy or rent, I can help.
Tel. (204)761-6884 [email protected]
REAL ESTATE
Farms & Ranches – Manitoba
REAL ESTATE
Farms & Ranches – Manitoba
FOR SALE: STE.ROSE Ranch(Ste.Amelie). 14quarters(2,234.85-acs) of fenced land in one block.
240-ac of Class 3 land under cultivation. 2-mi to
paved hi-way. Contact Golden Plains Realty
Ph:(204)745-3677.
SELLING YOUR FARM. Some agents sell houses,
some sell cottages, some sell stores, some sell
condominiums, some sell everything, some nothing.
Some sell at half price. We @ www.manitobafarms
Sell Farms, Land & Rural Property. Call Harold
(204)253-7373 Delta Real Estate (204)223-8101.
Grain Farm For Sale
3290 acre grain farm for sale south of
Killarney, MB only 1/4 mile from paved
HWY. 233,000 bushels grain storage,
68’ * 60’ fully loaded workshop, 100’
truck scale. Contact Stacey Hiebert
at 1-204-371-5930
www.canadianfarmrealty.com
Royal LePage Riverbend Realty
REAL ESTATE
Farms & Ranches – Wanted
FARMS WANTED. If you are considering selling
your farm, contact me. I have eight years experience selling farms and farmed all my life. All discussions are confidential. Rick Taylor, Homelife Home
Professional Realty. (204)867-7551, [email protected] www.homelifepro.com
Alfalfa Hay 1st, 2nd & 3rd cut alfalfa in 3x3 square
bales. Hay tests available. Priced from 4-10 cents lb.
(204)825-7180
ALFALFA 3X3 SQUARE BALES. Dairy quality 1st,
2nd & 3rd cut available. Have feed tests; Also have
beef quality mixed alfalfa/grass hay. Also Have
horse hay quality timothy/orchard grass in big &
small squares. Wheat straw in bigs as well. Delivery
available. Phone Daryl:(204)856-3561 for pricing.
FIRST CUT ALFALFA, ALFALFA grass hay for
sale, medium squares, can deliver. Phone
(204)642-3259 or (204)642-3043.
FOR SALE: 1ST & 2nd cut Alfalfa Brome Timothy
bales, 70% Alfalfa 30% Grass, avg 1,200-lb bales,
$38
per
bale.
Phone
(204)344-5360
or
(204)781-4504.
FOR SALE: 5X6 STRAW round bales, $17 per
bale. (204)447-0184 or (204)447-2756.
LARGE ROUND 3RD CUT alfalfa grass mix bales,
No rain. Also some 1st & 2nd cut. Phone:
(204)642-7684.
LARGE ROUND BALES, Feed tested, netwrapped, no rain. Phone (204)723-0658, email [email protected] Notre Dame, MB.
LARGE ROUND BALES OF wheat & oat straw;
Large round bales of hay. Phone:(204)325-2416.
ROUND BALES OF ALFALFA Grass Hay 1,250lbs to 1,300-lbs, small squares, Alfalfa Grass mixtures, also small square Wheat Straw bales, store
in shed. Also 2 yearling Black Angus bulls. Phone
(204)886-2083.
BUYING:
HEATED CANOLA
& FLAX
• Competitive Prices
• Prompt Movement
• Spring Thrashed
MALT BARLEY
“ON FARM PICK UP”
*6-Row*
1-877-250-5252
MALT
BARLEY
Celebration
& Tradition
*2-Row*
ACbuy
Metcalfe,
CDC
Copeland
& AAC Synergy
We
feed
barley,
feed
wheat,
MALT
BARLEY
MALT
BARLEY
oats,
soybeans,
corn
& canola
We buy
feed*2-Row*
barley,
feed
wheat,
*6-Row* & AAC Synergy
ACoats,
Metcalfe,
CDC Copeland
soybeans,
corn & canola
& Tradition
COMECelebration
SEE US AT
AG DAYS IN
We buy feed barley, feed wheat,
THE
CONVENTION
HALL
SEE barley,
US AT AG
DAYS
IN
WeCOME
buy feed
feed
wheat,
oats,
soybeans,
corn
& canola
CONVENTION
HALL
BOOTH
1309&
oats,THE
soybeans,
corn
canola
BOOTH
1309
COME SEE
US AT
AG DAYS IN
COME
SEE
US AT AG HALL
DAYS IN
THE
CONVENTION
THE CONVENTION
BOOTH 1309 HALL
BOOTH 1309
2013 Malt Contracts Available
2016 AOG Malt Contracts Available
Box 238 Letellier, MB. R0G 1C0
BoxPhone
238 Letellier,
MB. R0G 1C0
204-737-2000
Phone
204-737-2000
2014Toll-Free
AOG
Malt
Contracts Available
1-800-258-7434
Toll-Free 1-800-258-7434
BoxMalt
238
MB. R0G
1C0
Agent:
M &Letellier,
J Weber-Arcola,
SK.
2013
Contracts
Available
Agent: M & J Weber-Arcola, SK.
Phone
204-737-2000
Phone
306-455-2509
Box 238
Letellier,
MB.
R0G
1C0
Phone 306-455-2509
Toll-Free
1-800-258-7434
Phone 204-737-2000
Agent:
M & 1-800-258-7434
J Weber-Arcola, SK.
Toll-Free
FARMERS,
RANCHERS,
Phone
Agent:
M & J 306-455-2509
Weber-Arcola,
SK.
PhonePROCESSORS
306-455-2509
SEED
MALT BARLEY
FOR SALE: 15 ANGUS Hereford X Heifer Calves,
will make excellent cows. Call Don Guilford, Hereford Ranch (204)873-2430, Clearwater.
COMMON SEED
Forage Seeds
WANTED:
BUTCHER
HOGS
SOWS AND BOARS
FOR EXPORT
SEED/FEED/GRAIN
Grain Wanted
*6-Row*
Celebration & Tradition
We buy feed barley, feed wheat,
oats, soybeans, corn & canola
BLACK ANGUS BULLS YEARLINGS & Long
Yearlings, some Heifer Bulls, semen tested & performance records avail. Call Don Guilford, Hereford
Ranch (204)873-2430, Clearwater.
COMMON SEED
COME SEE US AT AG DAYS IN
THE CONVENTION HALL
BOOTH 1309
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Bull Sale, March 4th, 2016, 1:00pm. Heartland Livestock Brandon. Selling 100 Yearling Black Angus
Bulls. For Catalogue or more information call Jack
Hart, Brookmore Angus (204)476-2607 or email
[email protected] Barb Airey manager
HBH Farms (204)566-2134 email [email protected] Sale management Doug Henderson
(403)782-3888 or (403)350-8541.
LIVESTOCK
Swine Wanted
2013 Malt Contracts Available
Box 238 Letellier, MB. R0G 1C0
Phone 204-737-2000
Toll-Free 1-800-258-7434
Agent: M & J Weber-Arcola, SK.
Phone 306-455-2509
LIVESTOCK
Cattle – Black Angus
BUYING ALL FEED GRAINS
Heated/Spring Threshed
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Flax, Wheat, Durum, Lentils, Peas,
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We provide
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32
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
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33
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
MORE NEWS
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LOCAL , NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Conversion to organic paid off
for this Pipestone-area farm
They switched to organic to add value to their small beef herd
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON
Co-operator staff
O
wners of a Pipestone-area
farm that has more than
tripled its cropped acres
in less than a decade say it’s all
due to switching from conventional to organic.
Bryce Lobreau, who farms with
his parents Danny and Robin,
said they decided to transition
their farm in 2009 to add more
value to their small livestock
operation.
“We were just trying to create
some extra income out of the cattle,” said Lobreau. “Times were
gruelling through the recession.”
It might have seemed like a
gamble at a time when consumers of organics were also feeling the pinch of a downturned
economy.
But the timing proved just
right, said Lobreau. By the time
they’d completed their transition
and were ready to sell organic fat
cattle, there were buyers more
than ready to buy. By 2012, the
sector had bounced back and
consumer demand for organic
food was higher than ever.
“We got into this at the right
time,” said Lobreau. “We were in
the right spot to grow with the
market.”
Pipestone-area beef producer Bryce Lobreau wants other farmers to know about
the opportunities in organic farming. PHOTO: LAURA TELFORD
To d a y P r i s t i n e P r a i r i e
Organics is Manitoba’s largest
organic livestock feeder, with
a land base of 5,000 acres. The
land is in mostly hay land and
improved pasture, but there is
1,000 cropped acres. Their herd
of beef cows now numbers 250
animals and they also raise and
sell between 1,000 and 1,500 cattle a year.
Profitability
Adding an additional 800
cropped acres to what was previ-
ously just 200 all happened after
2009. That expansion is all due
to increased farm profitability
in a market where demand for
what they had to sell far outstripped supply.
“It (the transition to organic)
is the single reason we’ve been
able to expand this quick,” he
said.
They sell live cattle to buyers
representing meat companies
in the U.S., Ontario and B.C.,
earning a premium of anywhere
from 30 to 50 per cent.
The price paid for organically
raised beef has consistently
remained higher than conventional, usually hovering around
whatever the cash market is
paying plus a dollar on the hot
hanging weight, Lobreau said.
And while many farmers are
wary of the transition process
and time it takes, Lobreau said it
was a fairly straightforward procedure for their farm, which was
mostly forage and hay land.
“We were practically organic
anyways,” said Lobreau. “We
just weren’t certified. We had to
make only minor changes to our
operation.”
As for day-to-day operational
management of an organic
operation, Lobreau said there is
more paperwork involved and
the regime requires more forward planning.
“Keeping track of everything
and keeping better records
would probably be the biggest
changes,” he said.
Organic cattle can only be fed
organically grown grains, so a
producer must continually have
feed supplies lined up well in
advance.
“It’s supply chain management,” he said. “We’re buying
grain because we don’t grow
all of our own feed. So rela-
tionships with other farmers
and your feed suppliers... you
have to look after that. You
can’t find that kind of grain
everywhere.”
Capturing the premiums for
organically raised cattle also
requires a commitment to marketing. Timing is everything if
you’re going to capture the full
organic premium.
“You’re marketing your cattle
in advance,” he said. “You can’t
afford to put all this expensive
grain in them and then all of a
sudden have to send them to an
auction mart.”
Seller’s market
But he has no problem finding buyers. On the contrary, it’s
more a matter of taking his pick.
“On the organic side there’s
not enough to even meet the
demand for it right now,” he said.
Lobreau said organic production is definitely something he’d
urge other farmers to consider.
“For young farmers who don’t
have the capital to pay for the
inputs, organic is a good way to
get started,” he said.
“It’s 100 per cent the reason we
were able to get to the size we did
in the amount of time we did.”
[email protected]
Organic potatoes a tough row to hoe — but profitability
makes the effort to produce them worthwhile
Kroeker Farms Ltd. has been growing organic potatoes since the early 2000s
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON
Co-operator staff
I
t was more than a hunch that
prompted one of Canada’s leading
potato producers to begin to transition a few acres to an organic production system in 1999.
The evidence was mounting that
organics had potential, said Wayne
Rempel, CEO of Kroeker Farms Ltd. in an
interview.
“We felt that there was a growing market for organic. The marketing side of it
intrigued us,” he said.
Today Poplar Grove Farm, a wholly
owned subsidiary of Kroeker Farms Ltd.,
is Manitoba’s largest certified organic
grower of red, yellow and russet potatoes
and one of relatively few large organic
vegetable producers in the entire country.
They also grow onions in an organic rotation near Winkler.
Those 20 acres certified by 2001 have
now grown to 4,000 acres, or approximately 20 per cent of Kroeker Farms’
entire landbase. Potatoes and onions
remain their primary focus, grown in a
rotation with other crops including
grains, oilseeds, hemp, and hay. It’s a rotation designed to keep weeds in check and
boost nitrogen for the year they’re grow-
ing potatoes, said Marv Dyck, Kroeker
Farms organic farm manager.
“Our rotation is basically set up with
a horticultural year, followed by a grain
year, followed by a green manure year
and then we rotate back to a horticultural
crop,” he said.
They also use on-farm-produced compost as fertilizer and compost teas which
are a natural fungicide. Weed control is
achieved by a combination of mechanical
and manual means. To control insects,
they’ve experimented with various ways
and now use a range of controls, from
biosprays and bug vacs, to flamers and
even trenches lined with plastic to keep
potato beetles off the plants.
Complicated
It’s a healthy and productive system
that works now. But 15 years ago, when
they began they had no idea how complicated it would be to establish. It is
no small undertaking to figure out a
management-intensive system when
your focus has been on use of inputs,
Rempel said.
“It required a change in our thinking,”
he said. “We once thought that the soil
was really just an anchor for the roots
and it was just basically chemistry that
was needed. Now we look more to soil as
being biology.”
“We once thought that
the soil was really just
an anchor for the roots
and it was just basically
chemistry that was
needed. Now we look more
to soil as being biology.”
Wayne Rempel
CEO Kroeker Farms Ltd.
It’s been a process of continuously
learning by observing and working
with the land, and taking a whole-farm
approach, Dyck said.
“You have to be willing to get into the
biology of the system in a way that you
maybe didn’t have to do before,” he said.
“A lot of your solutions are not off the
shelf, but are more part of the farm. You
have to think of things ahead of time and
you have to be able to spend a lot of time
seeking out new ways of doing things.”
Plus, there were not — and still are
not — a lot of organic farmers around to
help you find those answers, he added.
“You have to be willing to seek out those
answers and be diligent about it.”
One of their biggest challenges has
been finding varieties best suited for an
organic system, Rempel said. A heavy
nitrogen user crop like potatoes not only
must be a very efficient user of soil nutrients, but in an organic rotation needs
optimum disease resistance and it has to
look good after harvest.
“There’s just a whole host of things to
think about when choosing your varieties,” Rempel said. “That’s been our biggest area of research.”
Has it all been worth it?
Absolutely, Rempel said. Organically
grown potatoes do not yield as high as
conventional crops, but they’re satisfied when they yield between 50 to 65
per cent of conventional. The premium
consumers pay for organic potatoes
makes this a consistently profitable crop
to grow in what is otherwise a capital
intensive, competitive industry with stagnant growth. Poplar Grove Farm-grown
potatoes are sold under an organic stamp
through Peak of the Market.
“Yields have been where we wanted
them to be and it has been worthwhile
to be organic,” said Rempel. “It’s a lot of
work. I think if we’d known how much we
probably wouldn’t have started. But it’s
working for us now.”
[email protected]
34
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Soybeans — the ‘kitchen sink’
strategy works, but…
Ontario trials suggest early seeding is the best and cheapest management practice
By Angela Lovell
Co-operator contributor
I
ntensive management can
improve soybean yields, but
growers should evaluate
whether each strategy pencils out,
says a soybean specialist with the
Ontario Ministry of Agriculture,
Food and Rural Affairs.
Speaking at the Manitoba
Agronomists Conference (MAC)
in Winnipeg in December, Horst
Bohner described more than
a decade of research to evaluate various management strategies to increase Ontario soybean yields — currently stuck
at around 45 bu./acre — by at
least 10 bu./acre.
Strategies evaluated include
planting date, pre-tillage, using
a planter instead of a drill, and
using inoculants, seed treatments, foliar fungicides and
additional fertilizer. Most have
given some yield benefits, but
early planting has proven to be
one of the most important, providing an average yield increase
of 3.8 bu./acre.
Early start best
“If soybeans are planted early
there is more time for the plant
to grow during the vegetative
growth stages, putting on additional nodes, leading to more
flowers and pods and therefore,
yield,” Bohner said. “Ideally we
would like to see six trifoliate
leaves before the plant starts to
flower. The only way to achieve
this is by early planting. If growers plant early they also need to
choose a full-season variety so
they don’t miss the opportunity
of late-season rains in August.”
Bohner noted that in
Manitoba, where the season is
already tight for growing soybeans, growers may have to
experiment with planting date
and varieties to see what works
best in their area.
He said many Ontario bean
growers are moving away from
direct seeding to some pretillage, mainly to handle heavy
corn residue. His tests with pretillage increased yields on average by 1.8 bu./acre. “Soybeans
don’t like a lot of heavy residue,”
he said.
The take-home message for soybean growers and agronomists in Manitoba is not to overdo soybean management, says an Ontario soybean specialist. photo: arlene bomback
Ontario soy growers are moving to planters rather than
drills. On average this seems
to increase yields by 1.8 bu./
acre, but the switch is more
about reducing seed costs than
increasing yield, Bohner said.
“When growers use a row unit
planter they get more plants per
acre because the seeding depth
is more consistent.”
The ‘kitchen sink’ strategy
Bohner said one strategy definitely works, but whether it
pays is another matter. That’s
throwing the ‘kitchen sink’ at a
long-season variety with a high
seeding rate of 250,000 seeds/
acre, CruiserMaxx seed treatment, HiCoat inoculant, Quilt
foliar fungicide, 50 lbs./acre
of N in the form of ESN and
ammonium sulphate, three
gallons/acre of 2-20-18 liquid
applied in-furrow, six litres of
SRN slow-release N and two
litres of 3-16-16 foliar fertilizer.
“This package worked nicely
“Meanwhile growers should try whatever
they want to try because it’s really hard to
significantly mess up soybeans.”
Horst Bohner
OMAFRA
in terms of increasing yield and
plant size. When we married
the concept of really feeding
the beans and growing a longermaturing variety we managed to
squeeze seven bushels per acre
more yield out on average and it
was essentially 100 per cent consistent — at every site we had
more yield,” Bohner said.
Unfortunately the cost of all
the inputs was $140/acre, making the strategy uneconomic.
The research did show the
value of a longer-maturing variety with 200 crop heat units
longer than recommended for
the area in which
T:10.25”it was grown
consistently gave an average
2.1 bu./acre more yield. But
Bohner noted that in Manitoba
this approach may not work
because of fewer frost-free days.
Fungicides — maybe
Bohner expects there will be
a trend to apply more foliar
fungicides to soybeans, but
again, the economics need to
be assessed.
He said that in Ontario, one
application at the R2 to R3
growth stage averaged about
two bushels per acre yield
increase, and spraying twice at
the R2 and again at the R3 to R4
stages produced an average of
5.2 bu./acre increase.
But it becomes an economic
decision and may not be a good
recommendation for everyone,”
Bohner said.
The take-home message for
soybean growers and agronomists in Manitoba is not to
overdo soybean management,
he said, adding that foliar feeding, and using biostimulants
and other additives does not
consistently change yields.
“Large yield gains will
require impacting reproductive
growth stages, which means we
need to continue to work on
pod set and retention issues,”
Bohner said.
“Meanwhile growers should
try whatever they want to try
because it’s really hard to significantly mess up soybeans.
They may take a yield drop but
it’s usually small. I’d suggest
only experimenting with the
amount of acres they’re willing
to play with.”
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35
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Italian
police seize
‘brightened’
olives
Old olives were
‘recycled’ with
copper sulphate for
colour
Rome/Reuters
I
talian police have
seized 85,000 tonnes
of green olives treated
with copper sulphate to
brighten their colour,
and thousands of tonnes
of foreign olive oil being
passed off as “Made in
Italy.”
Nineteen people
face charges over the
“painted” olives, including use of banned additives, the forestry police
said Feb. 3.
Old olives from previous years’ harvests which
had lost their colour were
“recycled” with a coat of
copper sulphate to give
them an intense and uniform green colour.
Copper sulphate was a
clever choice, police said,
because it is not normally
classified as a colourant
so food control authorities
do not usually test for it.
The home of pizza and
prosciutto has long struggled against counterfeiting of its prized culinary
goods, and police estimate the domestic market for fake foodstuffs is
worth around one billion
euros (C$1.54 billion) a
year.
Police also said they put
six people under investigation in the southern Puglia region and
seized 7,000 tonnes of
olive oil purporting to be
the Italian “extra-virgin”
variety.
DNA tests showed the
olives that yielded the oil
were not from Italy, until
recently the world’s second-biggest olive oil producer, but places including Syria and Turkey, the
police statement said.
Thousands of tonnes of
foreign oil falsely labelled
as Italian had also been
sold in the U.S. and
Japan, police said.
Italian authorities say
the olive industry’s 201415 nightmare year, when
bad weather, a fruit fly
blight and a deadly bacter ium hit crops, left
the market more vulnerable to the risk of
counterfeiting.
Overexposure to copper
sulphate, normally used
in pesticide products,
can cause nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain.
It can be lethal in some
cases.
Price spikes spur crop chemical
theft from Brazilian farmers
Chemical costs rise on Brazilian reals’ decline against U.S. dollars
BY GUSTAVO BONATO
Sorriso/Reuters
A
spike in pesticide prices
in Brazil, after a slump in
the country’s currency,
has spurred numerous thefts
on farms in Mato Grosso, the
country’s top grain-producing
state, stoking grower concern as
the region’s soy harvest begins
in earnest.
The cases of agrochemical
theft in Mato Grosso, mainly
from on-farm storage rooms,
jumped 82 per cent in 2015, to
51 cases, from 28 in 2014, data
from the state police compiled
for Reuters showed.
The toll for the first weeks of
2016 is not yet available, but
anecdotal reports of robberies
are growing more frequent.
Agrochemical prices in the
state jumped 30 per cent in
“… gangs which used
to rob banks and
armoured cars are
migrating.”
Diogo Santana
Brazilian state policeman
2015, mirroring the Brazilian
real currency’s fall of about
one-third against the dollar last
year, according to Imea, a local
farm economy research institute. Most pesticides in Brazil
are imported.
Farmer Orcival Guimarães in
Mato Grosso had a cargo worth
1.3 million reais (C$450,000)
stolen in the middle of the night
last week.
“Neighbours saw two pickup
trucks with six to eight men…
They broke the storage locker.
They were thorough and took
only the most expensive chemicals,” he said.
Brazil’s soy crop is quickly
maturing, with fields already
being harvested, so farmers
need large amounts of pesticide
on site to combat weeds, fungus
and insects.
“Due to the high prices
of these products, gangs
which used to rob banks and
armoured cars are migrating,”
said Diogo Santana, a state
policeman in charge of investigating such crimes. “The profits
are higher and risks lower.”
Scarce police patrolling of the
vast expanse of Mato Grosso
and weak security on farms
make them easy targets for
criminals. Typically it happens
at night.
Robberies are carried out by
large gangs, on demand.
“When they steal, they
already know to whom they will
sell. They know which product
to take,” Santana added.
The soy producers’ group
Aprosoja said some farmers,
in debt and facing tight credit
with Brazil’s recession deepening, may be looking for a cheap,
albeit illegal, alternative.
“The problem is the farmers receiving the goods,” said
Aprosoja President Endrigo
Dalcin.
For him, Mato Grosso’s grain
output is not at risk — the state
harvests as much soy as Iowa
and Illinois combined — but
the thieves spread a sense of
insecurity among farmers.
“I, myself, almost got robbed.
We had to hire private security, as a gang tried to attack
my farm three times at night.
It’s really bad and unnerves the
farm workers.”
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36
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Syngenta welcomes Chinese takeover bid
Syngenta hails ChemChina’s ‘attractive’ bid and says regulatory hurdles can be cleared
BY LUDWIG BURGER
“I can’t imagine another
bidder making a higher
offer.”
Basel/Reuters
C
hina made its boldest overseas
takeover move when state-owned
ChemChina agreed a US$43 billion bid for Swiss seeds and pesticides
group Syngenta on Feb. 3, aiming to
improve domestic food production.
The largest-ever foreign purchase by a
Chinese firm, announced by both companies, will accelerate a shakeup in global agrochemicals and marks a setback for
U.S. firm Monsanto, which failed to buy
Syngenta last year.
China, the world’s largest agricultural
market, is looking to secure food supply
for its population. Syngenta’s portfolio of
top-tier chemicals and patent-protected
seeds will represent a major upgrade of its
potential output.
“Only around 10 per cent of Chinese
farmland is efficient. This is more than just
a company buying another. This is a government attempting to address a real problem,” a source close to the deal told Reuters.
Years of intensive farming combined
with overuse of chemicals has degraded
land and poisoned water supplies, leaving
China vulnerable to crop shortages. The
deal fits into Beijing’s plans to modernize
agriculture over the next five years.
“I was sent to the countryside at the
age of 15, so I’m very familiar with what
farmers need when they work the land.
The Chinese have relied mainly on traditional ways of farming. We want to spread
Syngenta’s integrated solution among
smallholder farmers,” ChemChina chairman Ren Jianxin told a media briefing.
With growth slowing at home, Chinese
companies are increasingly looking abroad
for deals that can boost their business
and help them diversify. If completed,
Patrick Huber
Mirabaud Asset Management
ChemChina chairman Ren Jianxin (l) arrives at Syngenta’s headquarters in Basel, Switzerland on Feb. 3 to
announce what could be the largest-ever overseas acquisition by a Chinese firm. Photo: Reuters/Arnd Wiegmann
ChemChina’s Syngenta purchase would
be more than double CNOOC’s US$17.7
billion buy of Canadian energy company
Nexen in 2012.
Shares in Syngenta rose on news of the
deal, but at around 412 Swiss francs, were
some way below the agreed offer price of
US$465 per share, equivalent to 480 francs
(C$665), reflecting market concerns that
the deal could yet stumble over regulatory hurdles and limited expectations of a
counter-offer.
“Syngenta has never been valued so
highly. Over the last few years the company
has failed to demonstrate it can generate
reasonable earnings on its own,” Patrick
Huber, a fund manager at Mirabaud Asset
Management told Reuters.
“We will definitely tender our shares at
the offered price. I can’t imagine another
bidder making a higher offer,” Huber said,
adding that although U.S. regulators may
not block the deal, they could delay it.
‘Appropriate and attractive’
Syngenta CEO John Ramsay, who
described the ChemChina offer as “very
appropriate and attractive,” said he
saw no major barriers and noted that
ChemChina — short for China National
Chemical Corp. — had secure financing
in place.
A source with knowledge of the deal said
the funding would come from a range of
Chinese players, as well as HSBC and China
CITIC Bank International.
“I think the overall regulatory approvals
will not be very challenging,” Ramsay told
Reuters, adding he expected antitrust regulators to acknowledge the limited overlap.
The Committee on Foreign Investment
in the United States (CFIUS), whose mandate is U.S. national security, would not
pose a major hurdle, Ramsay said.
Swiss regulators said their conditions
were largely met by the terms of the deal,
although they want Swiss retail investors
to receive the ChemChina offer in Swiss
francs and warnings to be given on foreign
exchange risks.
Syngenta’s board would still have to consider any rival offers, Ramsay said, although
there are tough financial penalty clauses
for both parties if they fail to deliver on the
deal.
Syngenta’s chairman said ChemChina
will be on the lookout for more deals as
China strives to improve its food supply.
“Obviously (ChemChina) is very interested in securing food supply for 1.5 billion
people and as a result knows that only technology can get them there,” Michel Demare
said.
Syngenta is already the largest supplier of
crop chemicals, excluding seeds, in China
with a six per cent share of a fragmented
market, the group’s chief operating officer
Davor Pisk said.
Lower grain prices, U.S. farmers’ resulting cutbacks in spending, and pressure
from investors to bolster profits have also
sent many of the world’s largest agricultural
companies scrambling to cut deals.
37
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Trans-Pacific trade deal signed
For Canada, the U.S. and others, two years of negotiations and debate lie ahead
BY REBECCA HOWARD
Wellington/Reuters
T
h e Tr a n s - Pa c i f i c
Partnership, one of the
world’s biggest multinational trade deals, was signed
by Canada and 11 other member nations on Feb. 4 in New
Zealand, but the massive trade
pact will still require years of
tough negotiations before it
becomes a reality.
The TPP, a deal which will
cover 40 per cent of the world
economy, has already taken five
years of negotiations to reach the
signing stage.
The signing is “an important
step” but the agreement “is still
just a piece of paper, or rather
over 16,000 pieces of paper until
it actually comes into force,” said
New Zealand Prime Minister
John Key at the ceremony in
Auckland.
The TPP will now undergo a
two-year ratification period in
which at least six countries —
accounting for 85 per cent of the
combined gross domestic production of the 12 TPP nations —
must approve the final text for
the deal to be implemented.
T h e 1 2 n a tions i nclude
Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile,
Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New
Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the
U.S. and Vietnam.
Given their size, both the U.S.
and Japan would need to ratify
the deal, which will set common
standards on issues ranging from
workers’ rights to intellectual
property protection in 12 Pacific
nations.
Opposition from many
U.S. Democrats and some
Republicans could mean a vote
on the TPP is unlikely before
President Barack Obama, a supporter of the TPP, leaves office
early in 2017.
U.S. Trade Representative
Michael Froman has said the current administration is doing everything in its power to move the
deal and on Feb. 4 told reporters
he was confident the deal would
get the necessary support in
Congress.
In Japan, the resignation of
Economics Minister Akira Amari
— Japan’s main TPP negotiator —
may make it more difficult to sell
the deal in Japan.
There is widespread grassroots opposition to the TPP
in many countries. Opponents
have criticized the secrecy surrounding TPP talks, raised concerns about reduced access to
things like affordable medicines,
and a clause which allows foreign investors the right to sue if
they feel their profits have been
impacted by a law or policy in the
host country.
In New Zealand on Feb. 4 more
than 1,000 protesters caused traffic disruptions in and around
Auckland and police said a
large number of police has been
deployed.
Chile’s Foreign Minister
Heraldo Munoz predicted
“robust democratic discussion”
in his South American nation.
Australian Trade Minister
Andrew Robb said the agreement
would be tabled next week in parliament. Opposition to the deal
in Australia has been building,
but Robb was confident it would
be approved, despite the government not controlling the Senate.
Secretary of the Economy for
Mexico, Illdefonso Guajardo,
said the TPP would be voted on
before the end of 2016, while
Malaysia said the deal had
already been approved, although
some legislative changes were
still needed.
‘Better access’
Canada’s Trade Minister Chrystia
Freeland signed the deal on Feb.
4, but has said “signing does not
equal ratifying.”
She emphasized Thursday
that the government committed
itself to a wide-ranging consultation on the TPP during its election campaign and that process
was currently underway.
“Why would you sign something you don’t know the details
of and may not even agree
with?” Tracey Ramsey, trade
critic for the opposition New
Democrats, said Thursday. “No
one in their right mind would
sign a mortgage without knowing the interest rate, yet that’s
essentially what (Freeland) is
doing with this bad deal.”
A demonstrator delivers flyers during a rally against the Trans-Pacific Partnership
trade deal in front of the government house at Santiago, Chile on Feb. 4. Photo: Reuters/Ivan Alvarado
Expor t-or iented agr icul ture and agri-food sectors in
Canada cheered the signing,
but warned Thursday that without a TPP deal, they could lose
out on exports to TPP nations
that already have bilateral trade
pacts with competing exporters.
For example, “we have been
a stable supplier of canola seed
to Japan for over 40 years, but
we are acutely aware that other
canola suppliers now have
better access to Japan than
Canada does,” Canola Council
of Canada president Patti Miller
said.
“Failure to participate in the
TPP would forfeit not only $500
million in new export market
potential, it would place at
serious risk $1 billion of current meat exports,” Joe Reda,
president of the Canadian Meat
Council, said in a separate
release.
“The moment that the TPP
enters into force, the status
quo will no longer exist,” CMC
executive director Jim Laws said
in the same release. “The global trading environment will
have changed substantially and
permanently.”
Canada’s agri-food export
sector, he said, “will either be
in a position to benefit from
the new world reality — or it
will retract under the heavy and
enduring cost of historic opportunity squandered.”
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38
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
MPC hopes to relaunch social media
presence in wake of threats
Staff at the Manitoba Pork Council were threatened after a pig named Mercy was sent to slaughter
BY SHANNON VANRAES
“So you have to be careful you don’t overreact
to it, but on the other hand, if you think there is
a clear threat to yourself or to your employees,
then you have to get police involved.”
Co-operator staff
I
t started with a loose sow
and ended with death
threats.
“It really got out of control
very quickly,” said Andrew
Dickson, general manager of
the Manitoba Pork Council,
recalling how public interest
in a pig found near Winnipeg’s
Perimeter Highway last May
quickly evolved into something
more sinister.
Nicknamed “Mercy the Pig”
the sow was found roaming
near Winnipeg’s city limits. A
passerby stopped and filmed
the animal eating grass and
receiving pats before police
assisted in loading it onto a
trailer. Before long, several
media outlets had picked up the
story and a GoFundMe cam-
Andrew Dickson
paign was set up to purchase
the pig and send it to an animal
sanctuary.
At the same time, the pork
council was working to find
the animal’s owner so that it
could be returned. By the time
animal rights activists offered
to buy the animal for about
$3,000, it had already arrived at
its intended destination, a U.S.
processing plant.
“That is what the animal was
raised for,” said Dickson, adding if there had been any issue
with how the animal had been
cared for or its physical condition, provincial officials would
have been called in to investigate. “I said the pig has gone
to the processing plant, but we
have 301,200 other ones and I’m
quite happy to offer them all up
for $3,000 apiece.”
But the story didn’t end there,
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he said as he told the story at
the annual Manitoba Swine
Seminar last week.
Soon Manitoba Pork’s offices
were inundated with phone
calls. Some were polite, but the
vast majority was not.
“We had more than 600 calls
to our office,” said Dickson.
“Two-thirds of them were from
the United States, there were
death threats; we had to involve
the RCMP; it was insane.”
The organization’s Facebook
page and Twitter feed were
also swamped with crass and
threatening comments, so
many that both had to be shut
down. Nearly nine months later,
the council has yet to be able
to relaunch its social media
accounts.
Dickson said the organization realizes the violent views of
the activists who targeted them
represent a very small minority of extremists, but he knows
future forays into social media
will have to take them into
account.
“When we relaunch these
social media techniques, we’ll
make sure that we’ve got some
strong controls in place and
we will be more careful about
restricting the type of material that we’re prepared to talk
about,” he said. “And if it gets
out of hand we’ll use the appropriate tools that these systems
have in place to maintain civil
conduct.”
Given trends in activism over
the last decade — which have
seen more emphasis put on
social media — he’s not entirely
surprised by the ordeal. In the
United States, these types of
tactics have been common for
some time, said Dickson.
“These groups are entitled
to their opinion, but there are
rules about civil conduct,” he
said. “So you have to be careful you don’t overreact to it. But
on the other hand, if you think
there is a clear threat to yourself
or to your employees, then you
have to get police involved.”
Speaking to producers at
the annual Manitoba Swine
Seminar in Winnipeg last week,
the general manager offered
some practical advice.
“You are being watched,” he
said. “This is the crazy nonsense that goes on and we’ve all
got to watch what we do, and
what I’ve suggested is really
check your trailer next time.”
[email protected]
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39
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Pork sector builds on hope
Four new barns will be built in 2016
BY SHANNON VANRAES
Co-operator staff
A
fter years of dealing with
new diseases, hog barn
restrictions and countryof-origin labelling, pork producers at the annual Manitoba
Swine Seminar were told things
are looking up for the industry.
“There is a lot of good news,”
said Andrew Dickson, general
manager of the Manitoba Pork
Council, during his state-ofthe-industry address. He cited
the U.S. repeal of country-oforigin labelling as a big win for
Canadian producers, one that
would help both sales and
profitability. New trade deals,
including the Trans-Pacific
Partnership, where also positives, he said.
Signs also point to new hog
barns being built in 2016, the
general manager noted.
“2015 was a big breakthrough;
we finally got the provincial
government to back off on this
anaerobic digester issue,” he
said. “So in a sense, the moratorium is basically off, we can move
forward building barns using the
two-cell separation system.”
Technically the province is
allowing new barns to be built
under what it calls a pilot program, one that is restricted by
location and requires producers
meet 11 additional requirements.
Bu t Di c k s o n s a i d t h o s e
requirements are simpler to
navigate than might first be
expected.
“Producers are already doing
many of these requirements,” he
said.
There is also positive news
on the financial side. Securing
financing for replacement
barns has been extremely difficult due to issues of evaluations, Dickson said. But now
Farm Credit Corporation has
indicated a willingness to base
evaluations on the cost of construction and not market value,
“We know we
need to have more
finisher barns in
the province, we
need to bring more
balance between our
production capacity,
and our processing
capacity.”
Andrew Dickson
which should allow producers
to secure the cash they need to
renew infrastructure.
But there is still much work
to do, and many barns to build
if the province’s pork producers hope to bring production
capacity in line with processing
capacity.
“We know we need to have
more finisher barns in the prov-
ince, we need to bring more
balance between our production capacity, and our processing capacity,” said Dickson. “We
are short about one million to
1.5 million finisher pigs in this
province in terms of our total
processing capacity.”
That translates into building
80 new barns, each able to house
4,000 finisher pigs at a time.
“At the same time our barns
are aging and we need to start
replacing our capacity to produce,” he said, adding that the
three or four new barns that will
be built in 2016 are only a drop
in the bucket.
In 2015, the province produced
about 7.9 million pigs, still far less
than in previous years. In 2007,
Manitoba produced roughly 9.5
million pigs, from about 370,000
sows. The number of hog operations has also shrunk in recent
years, said Dickson.
But Manitoba remains
Canada’s largest pork exporter
and things are heading in the
right direction, even as uncertainties about porcine epidemic
diarrhea and the U.S. swine sector remain, he said.
The council will continue to
push for a Hog Stabilization
Program as well, said Dickson.
“There is always more to be
done,” he said.
[email protected]
Georgia
now taking
Canadian
breeding
cattle, hogs
Farmed goods and
seafood are already
over half of Canada’s
exports to Georgia
STAFF
C
anada may be able to move
up to $2.5 million more in
live breeding cattle and live
breeding swine to the Black Sea
region each year, with new market
access to Georgia.
The former Soviet country’s
government will allow imports
of Canadian breeding cattle
and hogs effective immediately,
Agriculture Minister Lawrence
MacAulay and Trade Minister
Chrystia Freeland announced
Feb. 2.
Canadian Livestock Genetics
Association (CLGA) executive
director Michael Hall said the
announcement “provides live
cattle exporters with an excellent
market for Canadian breeding
cattle.”
“Georgia is a new market for
Canadian swine genetics and
our solid reputation will allow
us to further develop the swine
industry globally,” Nancy Weicker,
executive director of the Canadian
Swine Exporters Association, said
in the same release.
The government, in its release,
cited industry estimates that
the “total gains” from access to
Georgia could be worth up to $2.5
million a year.
Canada’s overall exports of animal genetics worldwide, by comparison, came in at $166.3 million in 2014. Georgia that year
imported US$1.7 million in animal genetics.
Canada’s agri-food and seafood exports to Georgia in 2014
were valued at $7.4 million. Those
goods included frozen pork, frozen Pacific salmon, lentils, frozen
chicken cuts, and trees, shrubs
and bushes.
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40
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Canada’s egg farmers to phase out
cage housing over 20 years
The pledge comes the same week as Tim Hortons, Burger King, Swiss Chalet and Harvey’s
move toward cage-free eggs
BY ROD NICKEL
Winnipeg/Reuters
C
a n a d a’s e g g f a r m e r s
plan to replace conventional hen cages with
m o re h u m a n e c o n d i t i o n s
over the next 20 years, amid
growing pressure from consumers, restaurants and food
companies.
The plan — announced Feb.
5 by Egg Farmers of Canada, an
industry group that manages
nearly all of the country’s egg
supply — comes as various fastfood and quick-service restaurant chains set targets for only
buying eggs that come from
cage-free hens.
“This isn’t something we’ve
done because of companies
making announcements,” said
Roger Pelissero, a farmer at
West Lincoln, Ont., southeast
of Hamilton, and first vice-chair
for the national group. “We
“This isn’t something we’ve done because of
companies making announcements.”
Roger Pelissero
first vice-chair, Egg Farmers of Canada
always have in our mind what is
best for our hens.”
The organization, which represents over 1,000 egg farms across
the country, mapped out a plan
that immediately commits egg
farmers not to install any new
conventional cage housing.
About 90 per cent of egg production in Canada is now in conventional housing, commonly
known as battery cages, which
are slightly larger than filing cabinet drawers and hold several
birds each. About 10 per cent is in
enriched housing, free-run, aviary or free-range formats.
The plan, to be overseen by a
national working group in collaboration with the entire egg
B:17.4”
supply
chain, calls for a shift
T:17.4” a 50-50 mix in eight
to about
S:17.4”
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BCS10493542_Infinity_105.indd
No
41
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
years, moving to about 85 per
cent alternative over conventional in 15 years.
“All production would be in
enriched housing, free run,
aviary or free range by 2036,
assuming the current market
conditions prevail,” the organization said in a release, adding
those projections “represent
a realistic forecast of what is
achievable.”
Manitoba Egg Producers, for
one, already announced in late
2013 it would ban the installation of new conventional cages
beyond 2014.
Egg Farmers of Canada said
it also hopes to discuss, with
stakeholders and consumers,
the benefits of the enrichedhousing model, “which do
not seem to be well or widely
understood outside of the
industry.”
Enriched housing provides
birds with more space per
bird than conventional battery cages, along with perches,
scratching surfaces and private
nesting boxes.
While not free run or free
range, the enriched model is
meant to maintain food safety,
reduce mortalities, limit cannibalism and other aggressive
behaviours and ensure adequate feed and water for all
birds.
‘Outrageous’
“This announcement is
a huge shift and we’re confident the market will make
it happen before 2036,” said
Sayara Thurston, a campaigner with Humane Society
Inter national, adding that
U.S. farmers have not made a
similar pledge.
Egg Farmers of Canada’s
announcement follows a pledge
Feb. 1 from Restaurant Brands
International (RBI), operator
of the Tim Hortons and Burger
King chains, that it would
move to 100 per cent cage-free
eggs for its Canadian, U.S. and
Mexican stores by 2025.
T h e c h a i n s’ e g g - b a s e d
menu offerings include Tim
Hortons’ B.E.L.T. bagels, breakfast sandwiches and breakfast wraps and Burger King’s
Croissan’wiches, breakfast biscuits, breakfast muffins, breakfast platters and hash brown
burritos.
Ontario-based Cara
Op e ra t i o n s, w h o s e c h a i n s
i n C a n a d a i n c l u d e Sw i s s
Chalet, Harvey’s, Milestones,
Montana’s, Kelsey’s and others, announced Feb. 4 some
of its brands will shift toward
cage-free egg supplies starting this year, and all brands
by 2020.
Mercy for Animals, an animal welfare group known for
its releases of undercover video
LIGHT ’EM UP
from meat-packing plants and
barns, had specifically called
out Swiss Chalet and Harvey’s
in its announcement Feb. 1
hailing RBI’s move.
Chains such as Subway,
Mc D o n a l d’s, We n d y ’s a n d
Starbucks have made similar commitments in recent
months, giving various time
frames.
Mercy for Animals president Nathan Runkle on Feb.
5 described the Egg Farmers’
timeline as “simply outrageous... If egg producers truly
care about animal welfare, they
shouldn’t allow animals to languish in crowded, filthy cages
for decades on end.”
Too much freedom
The two-decade target is
intended to protect farmers
from financial hardship, as
non-conventional systems are
more expensive, Pelissero said.
With files from Co-operator staff.
Manitoba Egg Producers, which has already banned new installations of
conventional housing, demonstrated enriched housing systems in 2013. T:11.428”
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news
Local planning
faulted in Texas
fertilizer site
explosion
BY M.B. PELL
Reuters
C-52-01/16-10493542-E
None
The Humane Society is also
disappointed Canadian farmers aren’t phasing out cages
entirely as the difference in
welfare between birds raised
in any type of cage compared
with other methods is “night
and day,” Thurston said.
Pe l i s s e ro s a i d t h e re a re
downsides to any system.
Chickens that have too much
freedom can peck each other
to death.
Ca n a d a , w h i c h m a n a g e s
supply and prices, produces
eggs mostly for its domestic
market. Prices paid to farmers reflect costs of production, meaning that egg buyers and possibly consumers
w i l l a b s o r b h i g h e r p r i c e s,
Pelissero said.
Mo s t o f a f a r m e r’s c o s t
of production is from feed,
however.
An explosion at a Texas fertilizer storage facility in 2013
that killed 15 people likely
happened because the owner
of the site kept combustible
material near a 30-ton pile of
ammonium nitrate, according to a report from the U.S.
federal Chemical Safety
Board Jan. 25.
The April 17, 2013 blast was
especially deadly because
first responders who gathered to fight the fire had not
trained for an emergency at
the facility and likely did not
know the ammonium nitrate
could explode, the report
said. Twelve of the 15 killed
were firefighters and other
first responders.
The board’s investigators
also faulted community planning that allowed the town to
grow up around the facility,
exacerbating the damage.
The blast at the West
Fertilizer Co. site in West,
Texas destroyed a high school,
an apartment complex and a
nursing home and damaged
150 buildings.
A Reuters investigation conducted in the weeks after the
explosion found hundreds of
schools, 20 hospitals and 13
churches, as well as hundreds
of thousands of households
located near ammonium
nitrate storage sites across the
U.S.
The mayor of West, Tommy
Muska, said he could not comment on the report because
the city is still involved in lawsuits related to the explosion.
Wanda Adair, former vicepresident of Adair Grain, said
she and her husband Donald,
the owner of West Fertilizer,
had no comment on the
report.
42
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
Zanzibar’s farm women learn law
to keep control of land
The area has no land policy expressly guaranteeing women’s rights to land they farm
The Zanzibar government
and several non-government
organizations have embarked
on a series of awareness campaigns to enlighten women of
their rights through grassroots
advocacy to get rid of discriminatory practices.
Social, economic and
political rights for women in
Tanzania are secured within
the constitution but experts
say women tend to have inferior land rights compared to
men and their access to land is
often indirect and insecure as
they rarely acquire land in their
own right.
BY KIZITO MAKOYE
Jambiani, Tanzania/Thomson Reuters
Foundation
Z
uhura Salim was not
entirely sure her family would ever recover a
piece of land that her father-inlaw seized when her husband
died in a fishing accident some
11 years ago.
The widow, who lives with her
four children in Jambiani village, South Unguja, in Zanzibar
in Tanzania, had grown food
crops on the four-acre farm for
years until her father-in-law
seized and tried to sell the land
after her husband’s burial.
Although Tanzania’s constitution upholds equal rights to
property ownership, customary
practices continue to impact
women who often only have
access to land via their husbands, fathers or other male relatives and have no idea of their
rights.
The situation is even more
complicated in Zanzibar, the
semi-autonomous archipelago
of the eastern African nation,
that has its own laws and no
land policy expressly guaranteeing women’s rights to land.
“I really don’t know why he
decided to take away the land
Learning their rights
A seaweed farmer lays her crop out to dry on palm leaves on Tanzania’s Zanzibar island in 2007. Farming seaweed has afforded
a degree of financial independence to some women in Zanzibar, where women’s rights to family farmland can be tenuous. Photo: Reuters/Finbarr O’Reilly
we really need for our very
survival,” Salim, 48, told the
Thomson Reuters Foundation
in an interview.
“I’ve suffered a lot because
I had no other place to plant
maize and vegetables to feed
my family.”
But Salim, who had to try to
eke a living from seaweed farming and bottling coconut oil,
fought back, taking her father-
in-law to court to try to retrieve
the farm.
For she is among a group of
widows in Zanzibar to receive
training on property and inheritance rights.
The training included an introduction to property rights, laws
on matrimonial property and
inheritance rights.
It was conducted by a local
non-government organization, Vitongoji Environmental
Conservation Association
(VICA), set up by Pemba environmental activists and funded
by the Foundation for Civil
Societies in Tanzania.
Sa l i m s a i d t h e t r a i n i n g
armed her with the knowledge
to fight back, challenging her
Continued on next page »
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43
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
father-in-law over taking her
late husband’s farm and denying her family a livelihood.
“I filed a case at the high
court. The proceeding went
on for four months and at last
the judge was convinced that I
had all the rights to inherit the
farm,” said Salim, who moved
back to the farm last August
and is again growing crops.
Low awareness and understanding of the laws in
Zanzibar are still huge barriers for women to access their
rights.
“If we do not get women to
be aware of their property and
inheritance rights issues, then
we have done a zero work,”
said Mohammed Omar, VICA
advocacy officer.
Zainab Suleiman, a resident
of Gamba in Unguja North district, was shocked to learn two
years ago that her husband
had stolen her title deed and
replaced her name with his
name.
She said the matter has
been resolved with help from
women’s rights activists and
land officials who managed
to cancel the faked title deed
and issue a new one with her
name.
How e v e r, h e r m a r r i a g e
has failed with her husband
threatening to file for divorce,
saying she undermined his
authority.
Not all cases work out so
well.
A few months after Salma
Haruni’s husband died, his
relatives at Kowani village told
her that she and her daughter had to move out so a male
re l a t i ve c o u l d i n h e r i t t h e
property.
Haruni, 32, who has a nineyear-old daughter, refused,
claiming she was legally married and therefore had rights
to her late husband’s assets
but she gave up the right after
a local leader told her traditional norms made it impossible for her to inherit property.
“I was brutally evicted and
since then I learnt a bitter lesson that a marriage contract
expires soon after your husband is dead,” said Haruni
who is now living with her
aunt at Kizi Mkazi village, a
popular spot for dolphin viewing in Zanzibar.
Salha Mohamed, an official from Zanzibar’s Ministry
of Lands Housing, Water and
Energy, said the initiative to
train women on their rights
was intended to empower
women on land and property
ownership issues.
“A lot of women out there
still believe that only men
have the right
to own land and
B:10.25”
property. This is wrong,” she
T:10.25”
said.
news
Mosaic cuts phosphate production
Reuters / U.S.-based fertilizer producer Mosaic Co. said Feb.
3 it would cut output of phosphates by up to 400,000 tonnes
with rotating plant shutdowns in the first quarter, due to weak
demand.
Fertilizer producers have seen profits hit by falling prices, triggered in part by weak currencies in importing countries such as
Brazil.
“The long-term positive outlook for phosphates has not
changed, but we are adjusting our production levels to match
immediate demand and manage our margins,” Mosaic CEO Joc
O’Rourke said in a statement.
Most of Mosaic’s phosphate operations are in Florida.
In October, Mosaic laid off eight per cent of its workforce at
a Saskatchewan potash mine and last month PotashCorp of
Saskatchewan said it would shut its newest potash mine, in New
Brunswick.
Mosaic is the world’s largest producer of finished phosphate
products and North America’s second-biggest potash producer.
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44
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COUNTRY CROSSROADS
CON N EC T I NG RU R A L FA M I L I E S
Small Farms Manitoba
marks second anniversary
Small Farms Manitoba has a busy year ahead with a number of initiatives on the agenda, including
website upgrades, strengthening industry relationships and the development of a food hub
BY JENNIFER PAIGE
Co-operator staff/Brandon
T
h e f o u n d e r o f Sm a l l
Farms Manitoba is hoping the organization can
grow its membership and raise
consumer awareness about
locally produced foods.
“Marketing yourself individually is important but we
are also a community and a
network and the bigger we can
promote this across Manitoba,
we can infor m more consumers about the small-scale
movement and the products
we have to offer,” said Kalynn
Spain, Small Farms Manitoba
founder.
Small Farms Manitoba held
its second annual conference
in Brandon Jan. 23. The oneday event featured 12 interactive workshops with a focus on
farmer-to-farmer learning.
“Small farming is what feeds
the world. In North America
we have a particular perspective that there is only big farming, but that is a very North
American perspective,” said
David Neufeld, Small Farms
Manitoba member and longtime participant in the organic
movement in Manitoba. “This
whole thing is about relationships and I think that we in the
room have a really good grip
on relationships with our soil,
plants, animals, and particularly with our customers,” said
Neufeld.
An online tool for
direct marketers
Small Farms Manitoba is a
social enterprise aimed at connecting consumers with local
food producers through a website and an online directory.
“I hope that we can be a sustainable, consistent network
and that we can continue to
bring people together, whether
it be online or at events like
this one,” said Spain. “I think
we all need to be working
together, meeting each other
and sharing ideas. That is how
we are going to move this thing
forward.”
Spain says the Small Farms
Manitoba website aims to be
a platform for all local food
producers in the province and
hopes further producer participation will create a bigger
package for consumers.
“This is a one-stop shop for
consumers across Manitoba,
so the more farmers who are a
part of it, the more variety we
can see and really get an idea
of what Manitoba has to offer,”
said Spain.
The directory currently has
157 farm listings and website
users are able to search farms
by location, products and practices used.
Kalynn Spain, founder of Small Farms Manitoba hosted the organization’s second
annual conference in Brandon on Saturday, January 23. Photos: Jennifer Paige
“I really hope to continue to
be the bridge between local
farmers and consumers. But
not only be the bridge, I want
to build relationships with
these farmers to understand
the issues that they are going
through and understand who
they are as people, so that I can
promote them properly to consumers,” said Spain.
At the event, Spain
announced Small Farms will
be upgrading the website and
directory over the next few
months.
“Essentially what I am trying
to do is create pages to help
the website be as user friendly
as possible,” said Spain. “The
farm profile pages will also
be updated and participating
farms will be able to upload
more photos. So, if you don’t
have a website, you are able to
use Small Farms Manitoba to
get you started.”
Strengthening
industry relationships
Along with website upgrades,
Spain has a lot in store for the
future of the organization,
including building relationships within the farming community and developing marketing streams.
“I t h i n k t h a t m o re c o l laboration between all farming groups needs to happen.
It is rare these days to have a
farmer who fits into only one
box. We see a lot of diversity,”
said Spain. “A lot of these farm-
David Neufeld, longtime participant in the province’s organic movement spoke to
producers at the Small Farms Manitoba second annual conference.
“I really hope to continue to be the bridge
between local farmers and consumers. But not
only be the bridge, I want to build relationships
with these farmers to understand the issues that
they are going through and understand who they
are as people, so that I can promote them properly
to consumers.”
Kalynn Spain
Small Farms Manitoba founder
ers are doing everything, grain
farming and direct marketing.
We see a lot of crossovers, so it
is important that the farming
community and different farm
organizations work together.”
Keystone Agricultural
Producers (KAP) president,
Dan Mazier was in attendance
at the one-day workshop and
agrees that only good things
can come from strengthening the bond between farming
organizations.
“I think we have some good
discussions going on and
bringing everyone all together
for events like this is a really
good step for the sector,” said
Mazier.
Spain said having Mazier in
attendance illustrates the willingness he and KAP have to
work together.
“Working more closely with
KAP, Small Farms Manitoba can
further those relationships and
further the work that is being
done for farmers of all shapes
and sizes,” said Spain.
Mazier says direct marketers
face quite a few roadblocks in
trying to make a profit, including a lack of processing facilities in the province, but notes
their adaptability to be a bright
spot.
“The thing is with the small
and beginning farmer, they
don’t have the baggage, they
will change and they will
change in a heartbeat. Whereas,
if you are a big processor, they
can’t turn that ship around
quickly, if at all,” said Mazier.
“ The direct marketer can
change on a dime. They can
manoeuvre and please the market that they are serving much
more efficiently than larger
operations.”
Spain has also taken steps
to strengthen relationships with various marketing
streams, including some local
restaurants.
“I am working more closely
with chefs in Winnipeg who
want to buy local foods, so
that maybe they can come
to me to connect them with
local sources,” said Spain.
“Connections like this are
really important to me
because those are the kinds
of people who I want to connect the farmers with. I hope
to start building these bridges
between farmers and both
individual and wholesale
buyers.”
Spain arranged for Dustin
Pe l t i e r, c h e f f r o m t h e
Winnipeg restaurant Prairie
360, to attend the event and
speak with producers on what
wholesale buyers may be looking for.
Along with connecting to
local restaurants, Spain has
been heavily involved in the
creation of the Winnipeg Food
Hub, which will be piloted this
April.
“I am working on a strategic plan with a few others in
Winnipeg. The basic idea is
to create a space where farmers can bring in bulk orders
and meet chefs, chefs can
make orders online and pick
up from there. I will be sending more information around
to our members in the near
future.”
For further information on
Small Farms Manitoba, visit:
www.smallfarmsmanitoba.com.
[email protected]
45
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COUNTRY CROSSROADS
Prairie fare
Take steps to avoid kitchen fires
By Julie Garden-Robinson
Food and Nutrition Specialist
NDSU Extension Service
I
recall a little incident that taught me a lesson a few years ago. My nose detected an
unpleasant scent. My brain recognized the
odour and soon my feet were running down the
hall. I think I leaped over my then-three-yearold daughter on the way to the kitchen.
“What smells?” my son asked as I ran by. He
was about 11 years old.
Dark smoke was coming out of the stove
vent. I turned off the oven, grabbed a potholder,
moved my curious kids out of the way and
opened the door.
I quickly pulled out a smoking pan of blackened garlic bread from under the broiler.
“Mom, you should never leave the stove unattended!” my older daughter exclaimed, echoing
the words she’d heard me say. She was eight
years old.
She was right. I had nothing to say for myself.
In fact, my kids seemed to be enjoying this
situation.
“Well, I burned this food on purpose, to teach
you guys a lesson,” I noted, tongue in cheek.
“Yeah, right, Mom!” my daughter said with a
grin. She didn’t buy it.
My son took a more practical view. “Do we
have to eat it?” he asked, gazing at the hunks of
bread that resembled charcoal briquettes.
I shook my head. We’re never too old to learn
a lesson. I had got distracted and left the kitchen
to tend to something, probably related to one of
my children.
Fortunately, I didn’t have a fire, just a smoky
kitchen. Does this mean cooking can be hazardous to your health? No. Cooking at home is one
of the best things you can do for you and your
family.
You usually will save money and you have
control over the ingredients you use. However,
unattended cooking can lead to fires. Often,
when we hear about home fires, they have connections to the kitchen.
According to a Consumer Product Safety
Commission report, cooking equipment
accounted for 40 per cent of residential fires.
Cooking was responsible for 27 per cent of firerelated injuries.
Do your fire alarms work? About 60 per cent
of fires happen in homes without a working fire
alarm, according to the American Red Cross.
You can help prevent kitchen fires and burns in
your home by following these tips:
• Wear the right clothes when cooking. Roll
up your sleeves tightly or wear short-sleeved
shirts instead of shirts with long, loose-fitting
sleeves, which could catch on fire.
• Don’t leave your stove or appliances, especially
deep-fat fryers, unattended when they’re in
use. If you must leave the kitchen, even for a
couple of minutes, set a timer as a reminder
to check the food. Keep a close eye on food in
the oven.
• Always supervise children in the kitchen. Try
to keep them three feet away from a stove
that’s being used or still hot. Keep pan handles
turned toward the stove.
• Clean ovens and stovetops regularly.
• Keep potholders, dishcloths and towels away
from burners.
• C heck that burners and oven dials are
turned off.
• B e sure you have a working fire extinguisher. Know how and when to use it.
According to fire safety experts, don’t discharge a fire extinguisher into a burning
pan of grease because it may spread the
fire. Instead, smother the fire with a lid or
use baking soda. Don’t throw water on a
grease fire or attempt to carry the pan to
the sink. You could spread the fire and burn
yourself.
• D on’t use a damp towel or potholder to
remove food from the oven.
• Test your smoke alarm regularly. We should
have one on every level of the home, outside sleeping areas and inside each bedroom, according to the Consumer Product
Safety Commission. Always have an escape
plan in case of fire.
Raspberry Applesauce Squares
Here’s a tasty baked dessert. Keep your eyes
on your oven.
Crust/Crumb Topping:
1-1/2 c. quick-cooking oats
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. butter
1/2 c. all-purpose flour
Filling:
1 c. fresh raspberries (or substitute frozen)
1 c. applesauce
1/2 c. oat bran or quick oatmeal
1/2 c. white sugar
Preheat oven to 375 F. Grease a 9x13-inch baking
pan. Combine oats, brown sugar and butter using a
pastry blender. Add flour and continue combining,
using a pastry blender, until crumbly. Spread half
the crumb mixture into the bottom of the prepared
baking pan. Bake in preheated oven until crust is
lightly browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from
oven and cool.
Mix raspberries, applesauce, oat bran and white
sugar together in a bowl. Spread the raspberry filling
onto the cooled crust and sprinkle with remaining
crumb topping. Bake until topping is lightly
browned, about 20 more minutes.
Makes 12 servings.
PHOTOs: Thinkstock
46
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COUNTRY CROSSROADS
Just in time for Valentine’s Day
Here’s some around-the-house ideas to show that you care
CONNIE OLIVER
Around the House
V
alentine’s Day is just
around the corner so
why not add a little
romance to your décor? A few
small touches will show your
significant other how much
they mean to you. It doesn’t
take much to show that you
care.
After a long day your loved
one may enjoy relaxing in
a bathroom decorated for
Valentine’s Day. How about
rose petals for the bathtub, a
new luxurious bath sheet, spa
slippers and scented candles?
If your better half needs a
serene space you could create
a reading area with a comfy
chair, bookshelves or a basket of books, a great reading
lamp and a cosy throw. Some
may appreciate a writing
desk equipped with stationery, stamps and quality pens.
Creating a place to get away
from it all, even in the middle
of the home, can be a loving
gesture.
If you have a fireplace with
a mantel you can create a
Valentine’s Day display on it
using various items from the
home. Favourite photos that
invoke fond memories set
in frames amongst candles
and fresh flowers are a nice
touch. You could use red candles, jars of cinnamon hearts
or candy hearts along with
your photos, and hang a garland of paper hearts along the
mantel.
Red roses are synonymous
with Valentine’s Day and are
sure to bring a smile to your
sweetheart. As mentioned
above, you can purchase less
expensive roses and use the
petals in a bath. Long-stem
roses are costly, but a single
rose in an appropriate-size
vase with a card will still be a
welcome and affordable gift
for your valentine.
A bouquet of flowers like
red carnations is also a loving
gesture for your better half.
Buy a large bouquet and be
sure that there’s a good-size
vase around to put them in.
Instead of flowers, consider
purchasing an exotic plant
like an orchid. Fresh flowering plants are always a welcome addition to the décor.
Purchase an inexpensive
chalkboard and write loving messages. Hang it in
the kitchen and continue
this throughout the year. Or
you could use magnetic letters to create notes on the
refrigerator.
Candles always create a
r o m a n t i c a m b i e n c e. Us e
inexpensive tea lights to create a flaming heart or spell
out ‘I love you’ or ‘Be mine’
on a tabletop surface. If you
have small children and are
worried about safety, you
can use flameless candles
instead. When the lights are
dimmed the flameless candles are quite realistic.
Frame your loved one’s
favourite song lyrics or sheet
music for Valentine’s Day.
Your wedding song would
be a good choice here. Have
a photo of the two of you
enlarged and placed in a
Create a getaway in your home for your partner to enjoy. PHOTO: BENJAMIN MOORE
decorative frame. These are
items that can be hung in the
home any time of the year
and is a reminder that he/she
is loved.
Create a romantic canvas for your partner. You
can purchase canvases at
most dollar stores and even
if you’re not a painter you
can stencil letters or glue
on letters to create a message of love. Use cotton or
jute string to create a message on a framed canvas.
Dip lengths of string into a
flour and water mixture (thin
enough to be like white glue)
and place it in your desired
shape or words onto the canvas, such as a heart or Xs and
Os. Allow to dry, then present
to your loved one or hang on
the wall as a Valentine’s Day
surprise.
Buy simple cotton pillowcases (or use ones that you
have) and use fabric paint to
write special quotes or words
of love on the large open
hem end. The fabric paint
is easy to use and once dry,
is washable. This is a really
easy project with a personal
touch.
An
old-fashioned
Valentine’s display can be a
lot of fun. Use sepia-toned
photos in vintage frames,
mason jars as tea light holders, set the table with vintage
dishware and fill a pitcher or
vase with red flowers. Use a
small section of a split birch
log to create a long tea light
holder — just drill out wells
large enough to hold a tea
light on the rounded side of
the log.
Surpr ise him or her by
hanging a message of love on
a bathroom mirror, or spell
out messages using cinnamon hearts or candy hearts.
Using a tabletop mirror as
the base will enhance the
effect.
Valentine’s Day is a wonderful opportunity to show
your partner that they are
loved and cherished. Don’t
miss the chance to let them
know that you care.
Connie Oliver is an interior designer
from Gimli, Manitoba
Cymbidium orchid — perfect for Valentine’s Day
A favourite corsage bloom for generations can also be enjoyed as an easy-care plant
By Albert Parsons
Freelance contributor
V
alentine’s Day is fast approaching! If you have a gardener in your
life and want to really impress,
consider buying a cymbidium orchid
as a gift. This plant has been linked to
romance and love for generations, and
many a beau has arrived on the doorstep
of his beloved with a florist box in hand,
containing a corsage made from a cymbidium orchid.
The plant will be sure to please with
its relatively easy care and its reputation for producing gorgeous, long-lasting
blooms. Flowers on a living plant will
often last up to eight weeks before they
begin to flag.
Cymbidium orchids are a bit different from other orchids, including the
phalaenopsis orchids, on display in garden centres and shops. They are often
called grassy orchids because they have
so much foliage — long, narrow upright
leaves. They emerge from fleshy pseudobulbs that form just above soil level.
These growths are not really bulbs but
swelling on the stems that the plant uses
to store water.
It is from these pseudobulbs that the
flower buds emerge in late fall. Many gardeners put their cymbidiums outdoors in
a semi-shaded location for the summer
as they can withstand heat quite well,
but must be taken indoors before frost
strikes, when they are given a rest period.
This involves reducing the amount of
water they receive (don’t let the planting
medium dry out completely), and subjecting them to cool temperatures. This
cool-down encourages the formation of
flower stalks, which eventually rise above
the leaves and burst into bloom.
While cymbidiums are not in bloom,
which is generally from late winter until
late fall, they should get a nitrogen-rich
fertilizer such as 25-9-9. During the
beginning of the cool-down period they
are switched over to a low-nitrogen fertilizer, such as 6-25-25, until they have
finished blooming. High nitrogen levels
encourage foliage growth at the expense
of flowers.
Cymbidiums like strong light, even
some direct sunlight, and an east window is ideal. Dark-green leaves indicate
the plant is not receiving enough light
whereas light-green leaves with just a
hint of yellow indicate that it is getting
the maximum amount of light it can tolerate. Cymbidiums are planted in a welldrained medium such as fine bark, and
The plant will be sure to
please with its relatively
easy care and its reputation
for producing gorgeous,
long-lasting blooms.
Cymbidium blooms are exquisite with their
colourful petals — flowers can be 10 cm
across. PHOTO: ALBERT PARSONS
orchid mix is available at most garden
centres. The plants should be watered
about once a week. Keep the planting
material slightly damp, not wet, and do
not allow excess water to accumulate in
the pot. Use pure water to avoid problems with a buildup of salts in the planting medium.
Orchids, including cymbidiums, are
a bit fussy about being moved around,
so when a location is found to their liking, leave them there. After the flowers all fade the stalks can be cut off.
Cymbidiums need to be repotted about
every two years or when the planting
medium gets soggy and doesn’t drain
well. Put three to five pseudobulbs in
each pot. Clay pots are best as they
breathe and water evaporates through
their sides.
A cymbidium orchid is exquisite with
its colourful petals and brightly patterned lip (labellum) and is a welcome
addition to any indoor garden... and if
the blooms evoke memories of a romantic prom date or other special event with
your valentine, all the better!
Albert Parsons writes from Minnedosa, Manitoba
47
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
COUNTRY CROSSROADS
Protests against dove
hunt prove successful
Minister has reconsidered and mourning dove
will not be added to list that may be hunted
Happy Valentine’s
Day from Country
Crossroads
If you have any stories, ideas, photos or a comment on
what you’d like to see on these pages, send it to Country
Crossroads, 1666 Dublin Ave., Winnipeg, Man. R3H 0H1,
phone 1-800-782-0794, fax 204-944-5562, email susan@
fbcpublishing.com. I’d love to hear from you.
Please remember we can no longer return material, articles,
poems or pictures.
— Sue
Memories of Valentine’s Day
The mourning dove will not be on the list of birds that can be hunted. By Donna Gamache
Freelance contributor
I
f you are one of those
Manitobans who love to listen to the gentle coos of the
mourning dove or appreciate
their presence on your property, you can breathe a sigh
of relief. Manitoba will not be
adding the mourning dove to
the list of birds which may be
hunted in our province.
Last fall, the possibility of a
hunting season for the mourning dove, to begin in September
2016, was being ser iously
considered by the Manitoba
Department of Conservation
and Water Stewardship. This
was in response to a request
GAMACHE PHOTO
which had been made in 2013
to investigate the biological
sustainability of such a hunting season — which is already
in effect in two provinces,
Ontario and British Columbia,
as well as in over 40 U.S.
states. Manitoba officials had
then asked that Environment
Ca n a d a - Ca n a d i a n Wi l d l i f e
Service undertake a biological
review for our province, and
were waiting for the assessment
before deciding. Now a decision has been reached.
In a mail-out last month
from Thomas Nevakshonoff,
Manitoba’s minister of conservation, he announced that
the department had “reconsidered the merits of establishing a season.” Apparently
this was in response to much
public concern. Nevakshonoff
states: “Having listened to a
number of Manitobans regarding this important animal, I
have reconsidered the merits of
establishing a season.”
Considering the popularity of the dove, and the small
amount of meat per bird (only
about two ounces), this decision will be welcomed by many.
Apparently, public concern has
prompted a change of heart.
Bird lovers who took the time
to write or call voicing their
opinions should be pleased
that their concerns have been
heard.
I don’t agree with the weathered old cynic
though he seems very wise in his ways.
He says nothing’s as good as poor memory
for recalling those good old days. All right, Mr. Cynic, you’ve a right to your views
but I’m strongly adhering to mine.
Valentine’s Day in our small country school
was enchanting as bubbles in wine.
At noon hour cards were created
with Cupid, his arrow and darts.
Lines of some efforts at poetry
embellished with rows of red hearts.
Years have a way of advancing
but the date with these hearts will prevail.
Older and wiser? Excitement remains
but now cards arrive via mail.
Some sentimental, amusing or witty
some adorned with white lace and a rose.
All placed in a cherished old scrapbook
from school friends and cousins and beaux! Wishing everyone a Happy Valentine’s Day.
Eva Krawchuk writes from Winnipeg
Donna Gamache writes from MacGregor,
Manitoba
This
Old
Elevator
I
n the 1950s, there were over 700 grain elevators in Manitoba.
Today, there are fewer than 200. You can help to preserve the
legacy of these disappearing “Prairie sentinels.”
The Manitoba Historical Society (MHS) is gathering information about all elevators that ever stood in Manitoba, regardless of
their present status. Collaborating with the Manitoba Co-operator
it is supplying these images of a grain elevator each week in hopes
readers will be able to tell the society more about it, or any other
elevator they know of.
MHS Gordon Goldsborough webmaster and Journal editor has
developed a website to post your replies to a series of questions
about elevators. The MHS is interested in all grain elevators that
have served the farm community.
Your contributions will help gather historical information such
as present status of elevators, names of companies, owners and
agents, rail lines, year elevators were built — and dates when they
were torn down (if applicable).
There is room on the website to post personal recollections and
stories related to grain elevators. The MHS presently also has only a
partial list of all elevators that have been demolished. You can help
by updating that list if you know of one not included on that list.
Your contributions are greatly appreciated and will help the MHS
develop a comprehensive, searchable database to preserve the
farm community’s collective knowledge of what was once a vast
network of grain elevators across Manitoba.
Please contribute to This Old Grain Elevator website at:
http://www.mhs.mb.ca/elevators. You will receive a response, by
email or phone call, confirming that your submission was received.
The last remaining elevator and annex at Birch River, in the RM of Mountain, was one of three operated
here by UGG. The first elevator, built in 1932, was demolished in 1980. PHOTO: GORDON GOLDSBOROUGH
PHOTO: EVA KRAWCHUK
48
The Manitoba Co-operator | February 11, 2016
DON’T LET GROUP-2
AND GLYPHOSATE-RESISTANT
WEEDS SLOW YOU DOWN.
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delivers the fastest, most complete burndown.
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offers the fastest, most reliable weed control to get crops off to a
clean start. It’s also the only solution that lets you choose between
a pre-seed or pre-emerge application in cereals and pulses, with
both burndown and residual control. So why hesitate when it comes
to resistance? Step on it. For details, visit agsolutions.ca/HeatLQ
or call AgSolutions® Customer Care at 1-877-371-BASF (2273).
Always read and follow label directions.
AgSolutions is a registered trade-mark of BASF Corporation; HEAT, and KIXOR are registered trade-marks of BASF SE;
all used with permission by BASF Canada Inc. © 2016 BASF Canada Inc.
Client: BASF
Publication: Manitoba Cooperator
.
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Tawn