Reading Time: 2 minutes Paris | Reuters — China overtook France last year as the world’s second largest wine grower by area under cultivation as it continued to plant vast fields of mostly imported grape vines to meet growing demand. The world’s second largest economy, which since 2013 consumes more red wine than any other country, has more than […] Read more
China’s wine growers beat France into second place
Leafy greens eyed in E. coli outbreak
Reading Time: 2 minutes Federal health officials suspect leafy greens as a possible culprit in sickening 12 people in Canada, mainly in Alberta, with E. coli poisoning. The Public Health Agency of Canada on Wednesday said it’s considering a “possible link” to greens, such as lettuce, spinach, chard, kale or arugula, in 12 cases of E. coli O157:H7 poisoning […] Read more
Young and old defining food distribution success
Separated by 52 years, Rudy Knitel and Corne Mans find how to succeed at food distribution
Reading Time: 5 minutes As good as you or better,” says Rudy Knitel when I ask him what he was looking for when he went in search of a business partner. A sense of humour apparently helps. Aged 74, Knitel did find his business partner, though. He’s Corne Mans, aged 22. A 52-year age difference might seem like a […] Read more
A food walk in India on the streets of Toronto
Follow Steven Biggs’ footsteps for your own eye-opening tour of the new world of Canadian food
Reading Time: 7 minutes It’s pretty clear that we don’t exactly know what we’re doing. The shopkeeper, looking through the window, sees our hesitation. He opens the door, looks at us, smiles, and waves us in. “Please come in,” he says. Not familiar with this stretch of city shops, we had paused to peer in the window of a […] Read more
Look north for fruits and vegetables
These Saskatchewan farm projects are winning converts in some surprising places
Reading Time: 6 minutes The northern village of Cumberland House seems an unlikely place to find a farm or a farmer. For starters, it’s remote — 450 kilometres north east of Saskatoon at the end of Highway 123, a notoriously bad road that spring can turn into one long mud-hole. The village, established by the Hudson Bay Company in […] Read more
Health Canada clears Canadian firm’s ‘non-browning’ apples
Reading Time: 2 minutes A Canadian company’s genetically modified “non-browning” apples have picked up federal approval for commercial sale after review from Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. The Arctic apple, developed by Okanagan Specialty Fruits and submitted for federal approval in 2011, “is safe for consumption, still has all its nutritional value and therefore does not […] Read more
Feared plant disease found on Australian banana farm
Reading Time: 2 minutes Sydney | Reuters — An outbreak of a feared disease affecting banana plants has been confirmed on an Australian farm, raising worries over the outlook for the country’s A$550 million (C$537 million) industry. The so-called Tropical Race 4 strain of Panama disease was confirmed at a farm in Tully in the country’s northeast after tests […] Read more
Loblaw’s ugly-duckling produce to get swan moment
Reading Time: 2 minutes Produce growers supplying Canada’s Loblaw grocery chains with fruit and vegetables are expected to benefit in sales through a new in-store marketing program for “misshapen” wares. Through its Real Canadian Superstore chain, some of its No Frills stores in Ontario and some of its Maxi stores in Quebec, Loblaw on Thursday launched “Naturally Imperfect” fruit […] Read more
The olive groves and vineyards of Liguria
Italy’s tiny farms are clinging to life as tenaciously as they cling to their hillsides. Now it appears they may have found their road to success
Reading Time: 7 minutes The road to the farm called I Cianelli runs out of the seaside resort of Andora, Italy, through the basil fields behind it. Narrow at first, the road curves up the stony hillside to a ledge overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, for it is here, from an impressive limestone house surrounded by native brush and olive […] Read more
U.S. approves first biotech apple that resists browning
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters — U.S. regulators on Friday approved what would be the first commercialized biotech apple, rejecting efforts by the organic industry and other GMO critics to block the new fruit. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) approved two genetically engineered apple varieties designed to resist browning that have been […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
