Reading Time: < 1 minute Farm Credit Canada (FCC) pledged up to $60 million to Glengarry Farm Finance Corporation to provide financial backing to farmers with credit issues, the firms announced yesterday.
Farm Credit Canada funds alternative lending company
Summer Series: Building a better farm business
[Best Advice] Is Trish Fournier creating the new template for how Canada’s farms will inject cutting-edge financial skills and strategic business acumen into their mid- to large-size operations?
Reading Time: 7 minutes Hiring farm business advisors isn’t a new concept, but the creative ways some of them are approaching consulting is worth a second thought.– April Stewart, CG Associate Editor Today’s farm operations are growing ever more complex. There are crucial production, financial, human resource, marketing and other management decisions to be made, and it is impossible […] Read more
‘You can’t hand it to them’
Every transition is unique. This one is too. But inside Kyle (left) and Bryan Maynard’s experience are nuggets that can transform the process for farms across the country
Reading Time: 10 minutes It all makes perfect sense. When, two days before their eighth and 10th birthdays, brothers Bryan and Kyle Maynard lost their dad, Kent, in a tragic farm accident, of course the future of the farm was thrown into disarray. Kent had grown up nearby on a Prince Edward Island dairy and hog farm, but in […] Read more
A word about your farm
Financial fluency is paying off for farms who learn the lingo
Reading Time: 7 minutes A growing number of financial advisors are talking a different language today than they were 10 or 15 years ago. Increasingly they see that the financial health of the farm goes way beyond the numbers on the balance sheet or income statement. They know those numbers are underpinned by some basic fundamentals that require sound […] Read more
Winding down: How will Canada’s aging farmers sell their land?
As the Besser family discovered, it can pay to play the long game
Reading Time: 5 minutes In 2011, Howard and Jannette Besser found themselves at a crossroads. The pair, who farmed 3,000 acres near Plumas, Man., had reached their 50th birthdays, their sons were not interested in farming, and they could see they’d have to start purchasing bigger, newer equipment if they wanted to carry on. “We decided to step out,” […] Read more
Funds for agricultural innovation
Partnership aims to send the message that agtech is a great place to invest
Reading Time: 4 minutes Developing an “innovation ecosystem” across Canada and increasing the nation’s competitiveness in the global agriculture and agri-food industry are the goals of a new partnership between Bioenterprise Corporation and Farm Credit Canada (FCC). “FCC is the Canadian standard for financial support and banking in agriculture and agri-food in the country,” says Dave Smardon, president and […] Read more
Analyzing your farm’s cash flow
Next Steps: Ready to tweak your farm performance? These cash-flow strategies may be the ticket you’ve been looking for
Reading Time: 7 minutes The last three of our Next Steps columns (see the ‘Related Articles’ links further down) covered the why, the when, and the what for ratcheting your farm business up a notch or two. The next logical topic to explore is the “how” of making your plans a reality, i.e. cash flow. I’m not going to […] Read more
Thinking about risk?
Next Steps: As Seth Godin says, it’s easier to paddle a canoe on a calm lake. Here’s a practical strategy for smoothing out the waves
Reading Time: 7 minutes Agriculture is not for the faint of business heart. If ever there was a job that should come with the warning “avoid if allergic to risk” in bright red letters, it’s farming with its cantankerous and cumbersome risk factors like weather, trade agreements and regulations. Risk has been part of human lives since we crawled […] Read more
You want to grow your farm business. But how?
Next Steps: These tools are a mix of business theory and practical on-farm wisdom, which is why they’ll help you find opportunities
Reading Time: 7 minutes In January’s column we looked at how the process of business strategy planning helps orient you on the goals map. But that still leaves a big question: How do you get there? If you’re an existing farm, this means developing a growth strategy. In 1957, Igor Ansoff, known as the father of strategic management, established […] Read more
Our ‘Amazon moment’
As Wade Barnes sees it, farms and farm suppliers can either embrace today’s tech disruption, or get ready to sell to those who will
Reading Time: 5 minutes More ag companies are testing the winds of change. They believe agriculture is on the cusp of another technological revolution, this time fueled by digitization and online connectivity. This revolution will bring risk, and it will bring opportunity. And, for sure, it will bring disruption. It will change what it takes to be successful, both […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
