Reading Time: 2 minutes Ontario’s premier has made it part of her agriculture minister’s mandate for the coming crop year to “meaningfully” cut down farmers’ use of neonicotinoid pesticides. In her mandate letter for Agriculture Minister Jeff Leal, dated Thursday, Premier Kathleen Wynne tasks him to work with Environment Minister Glen Murray, other ministers and “industry partners and stakeholders” […] Read more
Ont. ag minister mandated to cut farmers’ neonic use
Canada, EU wrap free trade talks
Reading Time: 4 minutes The ratification process can get underway on a Canada/European Union free trade deal now that negotiations have formally concluded, the federal government announced Friday. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, European Council president Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso released the negotiated text of the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) in […] Read more
Wrigley exec to lead McCain’s in Canada
Reading Time: < 1 minute The president of the Canadian arm of confection maker Wrigley is moving into the head office at McCain Foods’ Canadian business. Shai Altman will take the post of McCain Foods’ president, Canada, effective Oct. 20, replacing Darryl Rowe, who’d held the post since 2010 and announced late last year he’d be leaving the company. Altman, […] Read more
Fruit, veg exporters fear loss of U.S. payment default coverage
Reading Time: 2 minutes The U.S. could potentially yank the payment default protection it grants to Canadian exporters of fresh fruit and vegetables if Canada doesn’t extend the same courtesy southward, produce growers warn. Under the U.S. Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act (PACA), Canadian produce suppliers exporting into the U.S. have had the same rights as U.S. suppliers to recover […] Read more
Retired Thompsons Ltd. chief Wes Thompson, 87
Reading Time: 2 minutes A small family service is to be held Friday for the second-generation head of storied Ontario commodity handler and ag retail firm Thompsons Ltd. Wes D. Thompson, son of company founder Wesley G. Thompson and president of the family business from 1950 to 1993, died Monday in hospital in Chatham, Ont. of unspecified causes at […] Read more
PEDv hits third SE Manitoba hog farm
Reading Time: 2 minutes Manitoba’s hog producer body is taking farmers to task for “risky practices” following confirmation of the province’s third case of porcine epidemic diarrhea (PED). Manitoba’s chief veterinary office (CVO) confirmed Friday and announced Monday that a sow farm in the province’s southeast is the third to have animals with the PED virus (PEDv). Two hog […] Read more
N.B. ag minister among unseated Tories in election loss
Reading Time: 2 minutes New Brunswick’s incumbent agriculture minister is among the election-night casualties for Premier David Alward’s Tories as the provincial Liberals get set to return to government. Michael Olscamp, the Tories’ minister of agriculture, aquaculture and fisheries since 2010 and MLA for the Sackville-area riding of Tantramar, lost his seat Monday against Bernard LeBlanc, the Liberals’ MLA […] Read more
Canada/Korea trade pact’s final text signed
Reading Time: 3 minutes Now signed and sealed, a trade pact that’s expected to level the playing field for Canada’s agrifood export sectors in South Korea is waiting on implementation. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Korean President Park Geun-hye formally signed off on the free trade agreement’s final text at a ceremony Monday in Ottawa, three months after the […] Read more
Deere chain to pick up four S. Alta. dealerships
Reading Time: < 1 minute A southern Alberta group of John Deere farm equipment dealerships is set to become part of the Cervus Equipment chain. Calgary-based Cervus, which owns the largest group of Deere farm equipment dealerships in Canada, announced an agreement Thursday to buy up all shares in Evergreen Equipment, the owner of Deere dealerships in Bassano, Brooks, Drumheller […] Read more
CP challenging extended rail interswitching rules
Reading Time: 2 minutes Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) wants the courts to shoot down new federal rules that allow more Prairie elevators to move loaded grain cars on more than one railway, the Manitoba Co-operator reports. The Canadian Transportation Agency rules, launched in tandem with the Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act passed in May, are the target of an action […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
