Reading Time: 2 minutes Montreal | Reuters — Canadian National Railway (CN) lost capacity equivalent to 10,000 carloads, or one million tonnes of grain exports, in February due to rail blockades by protesters opposed to a pipeline project, CEO Jean-Jacques Ruest said Tuesday. Activists disrupted passenger and freight traffic last month to show solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en people, who […] Read more
CN faces grain export backlog of 10,000 carloads, CEO says
CN starts calling back laid-off employees
"Network recovery... will take several weeks"
Reading Time: < 1 minute Montreal | Reuters — Canadian National Railway has started calling back many of the 450 workers it laid off earlier this month in Eastern Canada, when blockades crippled operations on strategic rail lines, according to a company email sent to customers Friday. Earlier this week, police made 10 arrests and cleared a blockade in eastern […] Read more
Argentina ag ministry suspends registration of exports
Reading Time: < 1 minute Buenos Aires | Reuters — Argentina’s ministry of agriculture suspended on Wednesday the registration of agricultural exports until further notice, it said in a statement, a move that traders said likely foreshadowed a steep increase in grains export tariffs. “When they close the registration, it’s because something is coming,” said agricultural consultant Nestor Roulet, secretary […] Read more
Fraser: Rail blockades should be a lesson for all
Reading Time: 3 minutes Our latest so-called national crisis led to calls for police to arrest protesters and tear down blockades, but perhaps we should be thinking about how to prevent conflicts like this from happening in the first place. It’s amazing how much can change in just a few days. Canada’s Agriculture Day on Feb. 11 brought together […] Read more
Grain vessels backing up at West Coast
Reading Time: 2 minutes MarketsFarm — Vessels waiting to ship grain off Canada’s West Coast are backing up as blockades across the country slow rail traffic, according to reports tracking grain movement. Railway blockades have sprung up at a number of locations across the country over the past two weeks, as protestors express solidarity with Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs opposing […] Read more
Virus fears weigh on global shipping sector
Reading Time: < 1 minute MarketsFarm — Global shipping rates continue to decline, hitting record lows in some cases, amid declining demand and concerns over the coronavirus outbreak in China. The Baltic Dry Index (BDI), compiled by the London-based Baltic Exchange, provides an assessment of the price of moving major raw materials by sea. The BDI has fallen for 13 […] Read more
CN conductors approve post-strike deal
Reading Time: 2 minutes Canadian National Railway’s conductors and yard workers have voted for at least another two and a half years of labour peace with the company. The affected employees, members of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, voted 91.3 per cent to ratify a three-year contract with CN, retroactive to last July 23, the union said in a […] Read more
Thunder Bay wraps up active shipping season
Reading Time: < 1 minute MarketsFarm — The last cargo vessel of the year departed the Port of Thunder Bay on Sunday, bringing total cargo shipments through the facility to their highest level in half-a-decade. “Strong shipments of Prairie-grown grain and other dry bulk commodities from Western Canada buoyed the port’s cargo tonnage to 9.3 million metric tonnes, the highest […] Read more
CN kicks off recovery after eight-day strike
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters –– Canadian National Railway on Thursday said it was putting a recovery plan in place while ramping up operations after the country’s biggest rail strike in a decade. The eight-day-long work stoppage at Canada’s largest railroad sent shocks through the country’s economy with grain and propane shipments scuttled. The strike by about 3,200 conductors […] Read more
Propane shortage looms as CN strike hits third day
Reading Time: 3 minutes Winnipeg/Ottawa | Reuters — Shippers scrambled to shift freight onto trucks on Thursday as a strike at Canada’s biggest railroad, Canadian National Railway, hit its third day, leaving the critical fuel propane and other goods stranded. Some 3,200 unionized employees, including conductors and yard workers, hit picket lines on Tuesday in the biggest such action […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
