Reading Time: 3 minutes Crop planning involves decisions on return on investment and cost/benefit, and also cash flow and financing considerations. Some producers now utilize both agronomists and financial consultants to help build their crop budget. Optimizing crop budget planning is increasingly important as crop expenses increase and agronomic options continue to expand. Logistics, opportunity costs and strategy Logistics […] Read more
Summer Series: Build a better crop budget
[Land] Financial management is evolving as fast as agronomy. Your budget can have the best of both
Summer Series: The lease-back business of farmland
[Land] The future according to Bonnefield CEO Tom Eisenhauer
Reading Time: 6 minutes “Every other business in this country has access to outside investors and outside capital; why shouldn’t farmers have that too?” asks the CEO of Canada’s largest provider of land-lease financing for farmers. “Farmers should have all the same financial tools that a tech company or a mining company does,” Tom Eisenhauer tells us. “That’s what […] Read more
Summer Series: Choosing the right time to quit farming isn’t easy
[Land] Rumours flew when Bobbie and Mark Bratrud decided to leave the farm. But sometimes an exit is a carefully considered decision
Reading Time: 8 minutes The second that Mark and Bobbie Bratrud started telling people they were done farming, the news travelled faster than a Saskatchewan wind. “It was a rotating door through our house,” Bobbie Bratrud says. “Everyone was coming by to ask, ‘are you guys okay?’” Mark recalls three of the most common rumours: “Somebody’s sick, you’re getting […] Read more
VIDEO: Summer Series: Meet the Lindgrens, Pt. 3
Reading Time: < 1 minute In the final instalment of our three-part series, the Lindgrens talk about expanding the operation to ensure its viability in the future, how they leverage technology, and their process for making decisions. Watch part three now and catch up on part one and part two here.
Summer Series: Diversity model may buffer risk of farmland buys
[Land] Should farmers consider ecological diversity as a risk management tool?
Reading Time: 2 minutes Glacier FarmMedia – It’s the time of year that farmland often changes hands. This spring, there is an increase of sales in certain sectors, driven by land stress and owners’ inability to weather another financial or literal storm. Many of these properties are monocultures or singularly focused production units and highly dependent on one source of […] Read more
Summer Series: The family landscape
[Land] The Impact: Rising farmland values mean new farm opportunities, and frequent challenges for family harmony
Reading Time: 5 minutes Once considered among the most traditional, unchanging ways of life, farming today is being transformed. Farmland values are changing the nature of farming and farm business management, and introducing new opportunities and risks. Plus, they are creating challenges for farm families. Land prices are raising new questions about how to direct assets to different siblings, […] Read more
Summer Series: The right farm team
[Land] It’s the Catch-22 of the decade. Either buy that ultra-expensive land or someone else will. How do you make that decision?
Reading Time: 8 minutes Two years ago in June, Terry Aberhart got a call from an account manager at the land investment company that, at the time, was leasing him about 2,000 acres of his roughly 15,000-acre operation. “Hey, we’ve been having some unsolicited offers come in,” the voice on the line said. The account manager went on: “In […] Read more
Summer Series: Business on the ground
[Land] With these land prices, can young farmers hope to ever write a sensible business plan? Maybe, but it’ll take innovative thinking
Reading Time: 6 minutes It’s a daunting mix for young farmers. Land prices are soaring, production costs are climbing, interest rates are uncertain. And that’s not to mention the mix of international politics, market volatility and weather woes that are breeding black swans at historic rates. With 2024 almost here, it’s hard to be any age. But how would […] Read more
VIDEO: Summer Series: Meet the Lindgrens, Pt. 2
Reading Time: < 1 minute In part one of our three-part series featuring the Lindgrens, you heard how this farm family found other ways to diversify their Saskatchewan farm as farmland prices spiked. Hear more from the Lindgrens and their farm operation in part two of our three-part video series.
VIDEO: Summer Series: Meet the Lindgrens, Pt. 1
Reading Time: < 1 minute In a feature article earlier late last year, Country Guide asked why Jordan and Jennifer Lindgren made the choice of making their life as grain farmers so public. The Saskatchewan farmers and past Outstanding Young Farmer winners are aware this approach likely goes against the grain of what most farmers would choose to do, but […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
