Reading Time: 2 minutes I’m reminded of the old story of the preacher who learned a valuable trick very early in his career, although it was a trick that he thought was a bit unchurch-like and that he was careful never to reveal. When he started his sermon each Sunday, this preacher would sneak his hand into his pocket […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: The point of the telling
Editor’s Desk: Leading from the front
Reading Time: 2 minutes “Most bad decisions get made in good times.” We’ve all heard it, and most of us have said it. Except I’m not sure I believe it. I see precious little indication that farmers have been making bad decisions during the past five years. At Country Guide, we’ve been keeping our eyes open for signs of […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: Something about 2015
Reading Time: 2 minutes All of us can probably already list the events in 2015 that are NOT going to reshape our farms or make us look back a few years from now with pride that we were here at the time. Topping that list of no-shows is the federal election, scheduled for this fall. From east to west […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: If not now…
Canada's farm organizations need your participation
Reading Time: 2 minutes Canada’s mainline farm organizations are struggling for your support. They deserve another shot. That’s not based on their past performance. It’s because of the scale and the solvability of the challenges ahead. In other words, we’re at a point in history where farm organizations can make a difference, if they have good leadership. Those who […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: One boy at a time
Reading Time: 2 minutes As associate editor Gord Gilmour reports in the November 2014 issue of Country Guide, more women than men now attend our ag universities. I’m not being alarmist — at least, I hope I’m not — and I’m not a zealot for absolute gender equality in every job or every outcome. I note the irony too […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: Our farm advisers can do better
Many farmers are frustrated by the conflicting advice they get from different channels
Reading Time: 2 minutes There’s no question that much of the progress that farmers have made in the past five years has come from the quality of advice they have received. It’s impossible to weave an accurate statistical story of the progress agriculture has made since the bull market began in 2007, but I’m convinced that most farmers have […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: Who will the winners be as the farm sector evolves?
Reading Time: 2 minutes If you take Canada’s inventory of farm machinery and multiply its working capacity times an average number of days for seeding, spraying or harvesting, how many acres will you top out at? Can the average farm cover 20 per cent more acres than it is actually farming? Or 50 per cent? Certainly it’s more than […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: The bull is only sleeping
Reading Time: 2 minutes As Country Guide market columnist Errol Anderson (who returns next month) always is sure to remind us, commodity markets trade more on emotion than on fundamentals. Markets climb on a combination of confidence and optimism — and maybe a touch of greed — and they fall on fear. The same emotions drive the same cycles, […] Read more
The other view
Alberta grain grower Michael Kalisvaart says it’s time to trust our young farmers
Reading Time: 4 minutes I really enjoyed reading in Country Guide all the articles about optimistic young farmers excelling in their operations. Tracy Court, Gary Lenderbeck, and Tyler Devloo have passion for agriculture and are great examples of the opportunity available in our industry for young people. Then I read Gerald Pilger’s “A farmer’s rant,” and I found it to […] Read more
Editor’s Desk: A hot time in the city
Editor's Desk
Reading Time: 2 minutes There’s nothing wrong with a fishing lodge, of course. Nor for that matter is there any reason to miss out on going to a golf course or cottage. I hope to spend some time there myself. But a summer without some serious time in at least one of Canada’s great cities can hardly qualify as […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
