Reading Time: 6 minutes In 2017, 16,500 jobs could not be filled in Canadian agriculture, resulting in a loss of $2.9 billion in sales. When asked, 47 per cent of agricultural producers said they could not find enough workers, causing stress, production delays, lost sales, and delays or cancellations for farm expansions or upgrades. In the same survey, 34 […] Read more
Equal, and equitable too
In a new column, CAHRC’s Jennifer Wright offers strategies that can boost the opportunity for female family members and employees to contribute on-farm
Summer days
On more farms like Wade Bleier’s, summer can’t just be about crops and livestock anymore. Those days had vanished even before COVID-19 arrived. Now the challenge is even greater. How will they use this summer to take back control?
Reading Time: 13 minutes All Canadians pay close attention to the calendar and clock, but no one more than the Canadian farmer, whose livelihood has always depended on the tactical use of limited hours, days and months. Now comes summer 2020, and on top of all the uncertainties of weather, pests and markets, there’s no end to the COVID-19 […] Read more
Gauging employee productivity
Sure, your employees seem busy enough. But are they productive? Better yet, can you improve their productivity?
Reading Time: 6 minutes Of course farmers have an excellent grasp of their input costs. As in any business, the lower the costs, the better the bottom line, so farmers are constantly experimenting with different fertilizer rates, seeding rates, equipment strategies and so much more. And for everything they do, farmers track what it costs, what it produces and […] Read more
Farming in 2030: Big data
The last time there was a change this big in farming, it was mechanization. The question is: are you open to exploring how it can work for you?
Reading Time: 5 minutes If you’ve got a cell phone anywhere close to you as you read this, you’re part of the data revolution in agriculture, whether you realize it or not, and whether you want to be or not. That’s probably a good thing. Certainly, the potential benefits are amazing. “The smartphone is going to be one of […] Read more
Farming in 2030: Managing risk
Innovative insurance companies reveal how on-farm data is leading to next-generation policies that increase liquidity and profitability
Reading Time: 6 minutes As farming gets ever more expensive and as margins get tighter, there’s less room for error, which means the need for risk management isn’t going away in the next 10 years. What will change, though, is the type of insurance products farmers will be able to buy, with innovations driven primarily by technology and by […] Read more
A farm advisory team that works — for you
Advisors can help take the emotion out of business decisions
Reading Time: 8 minutes A few years ago, Harvey Aberhart came to a family farm meeting looking stressed out. Like many farmers across the country, he wanted the family to find their way to a healthy, forward-looking succession plan, but the night before the meeting, he had been kept up all through the early hours by thoughts of a […] Read more
The skills you’ll need as farms become more digital
Technology is transforming agriculture at a speed we hardly grasp. Will yours be among the farms that emerge stronger?
Reading Time: 5 minutes In October, Country Guide covered the report “Farmer 4.0: How the Coming Skills Revolution Can Transform Agriculture” published by RBC, with its emphasis on how the era of super-automation will change how we farm. “As Canadian farmers leave traditional tasks to smart machines, and focus on strategy and systems, they’ll be better positioned than ever […] Read more
Farm CEO: The complete farm executive
Reading Time: 3 minutes What does the basic mindset of a farm CEO look like? I’m currently using a three-factor model to describe what I think makes a highly effective farm executive. The first is business results. Obviously at the end of the day if we don’t define success and achieve objectives that keep us in business, never mind […] Read more
Farm CEO: Culture matters
Are you paying attention to the culture of your farm or farm business?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Why should we care about the culture of our business? Culture captures the essence of what makes a business tick, yet it is poorly understood. Culture has reached cliché status as a management concept, and that’s regrettable because understanding what culture really is, its connection to leadership, how it is created and how it has […] Read more
Having farm meetings that work
These strategies can make family meetings a core part of your farm culture
Reading Time: 5 minutes We’re too busy.” If that’s your reason for putting off holding family business meetings on your farm, you’re not alone.Agricultural business advisors hear their clients say it time and again to explain why they haven’t started holding farm meetings. Except as excuses go, this one doesn’t really hold water. Too often, in fact, it’s a […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
