Reading Time: 3 minutes Quebec-based fruit juice processor Lassonde Industries plans to buy its way further into the U.S. juice market — this time in the branded juice business, with a play for a national-level manufacturer. Lassonde and its founding family on Thursday announced an agreement to buy privately-held Apple + Eve, LLC of Port Washington, N.Y. for $150 […] Read more
Juice maker Lassonde buys further into U.S. market
Manitoba calls provincial emergency
Reading Time: 3 minutes A provincial state of emergency takes effect in Manitoba at noon Friday as municipalities along the Assiniboine River brace for flood levels above those seen in 2011. Declaring a state of emergency allows the provincial government to “take action to prevent harm or damage to the safety, health or welfare of Manitobans, and to property and […] Read more
Sunny weather doesn’t end Prairie flood risk
Reading Time: 2 minutes A period of relatively dry and sunny weather in eastern Saskatchewan and southern Manitoba between now and the weekend may allow overland water to pass, but doesn’t end the flood risk, agencies say. A high pressure system has moved into Manitoba and is expected to bring sunnier weather for the next three days, the provincial […] Read more
PQ’s first agriculture minister Jean Garon, 76
Reading Time: 2 minutes Jean Garon, the lawyer and founding Parti Quebecois member who served as Rene Levesque’s first minister of agriculture, died on Canada Day at age 76. Garon, the MNA for the provincial riding of Levis from 1976 to 1998 and mayor of Levis from 1998 to 2005, died Tuesday at l’Hotel‑Dieu de Levis, the PQ said […] Read more
B.C.’s medical-grade grows won’t be farms
Reading Time: 2 minutes The five production sites licensed to grow medical marijuana in British Columbia will not get to call themselves “farms” for tax purposes starting next year. The provincial government announced Wednesday it will exclude federally-licensed medical marijuana production from the list of agricultural uses under which a property could be classified as a “farm” for assessment […] Read more
Storied western Manitoba farmhouse burns
Reading Time: 2 minutes The centrepiece of the tale of a famously unconventional western Manitoba pioneer family has been erased. The vacant old farm home at the Criddle/Vane Homestead Provincial Heritage Park, about 10 km south of Canadian Forces Base Shilo, was completely destroyed by fire Wednesday evening. Blue Hills RCMP, in a release Thursday, said they were called to […] Read more
Ont. cabinet shuffle reunites farm, rural affairs files
Reading Time: 2 minutes Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s post-election cabinet shuffle puts the province’s agriculture and food ministry and rural affairs ministry back under one minister. Wynne on Tuesday announced Jeff Leal, the MPP for Peterborough and the province’s minister of rural affairs since February last year, as the new minister of agriculture, food and rural affairs in what’s now […] Read more
CWB makes bid for independent SW Sask. grain handler
Reading Time: 3 minutes Shareholders in southwestern Saskatchewan’s Great Sandhills Terminal are expected to meet this summer to consider a $17.4 million offer from the grain firm formerly known as the Canadian Wheat Board. CWB on Monday announced an all-cash $581.98 per share offer for all shares in the independent firm, which operates an high-throughput inland grain terminal on […] Read more
Prairie seed grower and inventor Harvey Gjesdal, 92
Reading Time: 2 minutes Funeral services will be held Wednesday at Birch Hills, Sask. for farm equipment inventor, seed grower and long-time Grainews columnist Harvey Gjesdal. Gjesdal, who died Friday at Birch Hills at age 92, was prominent for decades among Prairie farmers, in part for patents on equipment still in widespread use today, including the Gjesdal “Five-in-One” rotary […] Read more
Ag work mostly outside feds’ foreign worker plan overhaul
Reading Time: 3 minutes Canadian farms importing temporary workers won’t be subject to most of the federal government’s moves to rein in businesses’ use of temporary foreign workers. Employment Minister Jason Kenney and Citizenship and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander on Friday announced what they billed as a “comprehensive overhaul” of the federal Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP). Kenney in […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
