Reading Time: 4 minutes I’m one of a dozen women sitting around a long boardroom table. The surroundings are completely unfamiliar and slightly intimidating. We politely watch a video and quietly chat with one another about our farms, succession, our families and, of course, the weather. The woman across from me taps tentatively on the little microphone that seems […] Read more
Where are the farm women?
The research is incontrovertible. Diversity creates strength. So why aren’t we making greater strides at getting farm women involved?
A co-trustee’s responsibility
Guide Legal: If asked to serve as a co-trustee, be aware that acting as a rubber stamp will not protect you if things go wrong
Reading Time: 4 minutes When drafting a will, parents often name more than one of their children as the trustees of their estate. Given the dynamics between siblings, it is not uncommon for one child to take on a more active role than another in administering the estate. However, in a recent decision, the Court of Appeal for Ontario […] Read more
Africa feeding Africa
While North America’s farmers pin their career hopes on the need to feed a hungry Africa, that continent’s farmers are making plans of their own
Reading Time: 5 minutes A core belief in North American agriculture is that our farmers must produce ever more food if we are to have any hope of feeding the world, particularly areas like Africa where the population is growing so rapidly. The numbers are indeed staggering. According to the Population Reference Bureau, Africa’s population will hit 2.5 billion […] Read more
Turning friends into targets
Be glad you aren’t the CEO of a major machinery manufacturer in the new era of Donald Trump
Reading Time: 5 minutes Ever since Donald Trump sold 62 million American voters on the idea that, by applying border taxes, he could recreate a manufacturing landscape last seen in the 1950s, there have been sweat stains on the collars of manufacturing executives everywhere. Now, more of those executives within the U.S. are speaking out about what they think […] Read more
Pot farmers needed
With a projected $22 billion in sales, Canada’s new cannabis market is generating a very heady kind of buzz in farm circles
Reading Time: 9 minutes Working in total darkness, Thaddeus Conrad carefully feels his way up a nearly vertical set of stairs before switching on a single green light. The bulb casts a weak, eerie glow, revealing a room packed with heavily budded marijuana plants. But there’s nothing clandestine about the hazy light or the darkness, it’s simply great crop science […] Read more
Study abroad
More young people, including young farmers, are heading overseas to expand the skills they’ll bring back home
Reading Time: 5 minutes Of all the ways a person can prepare for a career, spending time far from the classroom and away from familiar surroundings may actually have the most impact. Lisa Blenkinsop, manager of the Studies Abroad program at the University of Guelph, hears this feedback over and over again from students who have spent time studying […] Read more
Taking charge of climate
Changing weather is hitting these B.C. farmers hard. Now they’re fighting back
Reading Time: 8 minutes Standing at the window in his kitchen, Fort Fraser, B.C. rancher Wayne Ray watches the heavy grey clouds and he shakes his head. It’s July — haying season — but the rain won’t let him get at it. Ray is lucky. He hasn’t yet cut his hay yet, so at least it isn’t laying in […] Read more
The census mystery on Canadian farms
29,000 mid-career farms have disappeared in just five years. What happened?
Reading Time: 9 minutes For the most part, the 2016 Census of Agriculture was as unsurprising as most farmers might have expected. We already knew that farms are getting larger, and that farmers are getting older. But the census did reveal something striking — a shocking reduction in the number of mid-career farmers between the ages of 35 and […] Read more
Three farm families, five years later
Country Guide revisits three young Manitoba farm families building their future in agriculture
Reading Time: 2 minutes In 2012, Country Guide discovered a cluster of young farmers near out-of-the-way Cartwright, Man. They were all searching for ways to start small in the heart of big-farm Canada, and they all saw their best chance in a combination of direct marketing and holistic practices. To some readers, it seemed like a dream. To others, […] Read more
Five years on: Michelle Schram and Troy Stozek
Country Guide revisits Fresh Roots Farm and its focus on direct-marketing
Reading Time: 7 minutes Back in 2012, Michelle Schram and Troy Stozek’s biggest goal was to quit their off-farm jobs and farm full time. It’s something that Stozek has more or less managed to do, although Schram still works part-time at her parents’ ranch supply store. Schram and Stozek originally established Fresh Roots Farm as a Community Supported Agriculture […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
