(Dave Bedard photo)

AAFC forecasts more wheat, less canola seeded in spring

Reading Time: 2 minutes MarketsFarm — Canada’s farmers will seed more wheat and less canola in the 2020 growing season, according to the first supply/demand estimates for the 2020-21 marketing year, released Thursday by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. Total seeded wheat area is forecast to rise to 25.77 million acres, from 25.02 million the previous year. Production is forecast […] Read more

CBOT December 2019 oats with 20-, 50- and 100-day moving averages. (Barchart)

U.S. grains: Soy, corn fall as hopes fade for China trade deal this year

Reading Time: 2 minutes Chicago | Reuters — U.S. corn futures fell to a two-month low and soybean futures hit a seven-week low on Wednesday on fading expectations for a U.S.-China trade deal before the end of the year, analysts said. Chicago Board of Trade wheat futures closed modestly higher on technical buying and concerns about this week’s decline […] Read more


Photo: File/Greg Berg

Prairie oats market stable, but strong

Reading Time: 2 minutes Oats bids in Western Canada have stabilized for the time being, as the weather concerns that propped up the market at the beginning of the month are largely factored in. “It’s a pretty stable market. Stable, but strong,” said Scott Shiels, of Grain Millers Inc. in Yorkton, Sask. Prices moved up at the beginning of […] Read more

Paterson Grain’s current elevator at Rosser, Man., is the largest in its Prairie primary grain handling network at 121,000 tonnes capacity. (Dave Bedard file photo)

Paterson stakes Manitoba site for oat processing plant

Reading Time: 2 minutes Up to a quarter million tonnes of oats per year could find a new end use as a Winnipeg agrifood company sets up a new oat processing plant near its home base. Privately-held Paterson GlobalFoods (PGF) announced Thursday it will start construction “immediately” on the new plant, on part of its 600-acre site next to […] Read more


Barry Senft, shown here at the Ottawa Valley Farm Show in a 2017 GFO video, is stepping down in April as the organization’s chief executive. (GFO video screengrab via YouTube)

Grain Farmers of Ontario seeking new CEO

Reading Time: < 1 minute Ontario’s biggest ag commodity organization is on the hunt for a new CEO as its first chief prepares to exit. Barry Senft announced Tuesday he will step down as CEO of Grain Farmers of Ontario in April 2020, a post he’s held since the 2009 merger of the province’s corn, soy and wheat grower groups […] Read more



(Doug Wilson photo courtesy ARS/USDA)

Large oat production won’t move prices

Reading Time: < 1 minute MarketsFarm — While the most recent crop production report from Statistics Canada predicted significantly more oats than originally expected, prices will likely remain stable. Statistics Canada estimated 3.952 million tonnes of oats will be grown in 2019, up considerably from the 3.436 million tonnes produced in 2018. But low carryover stocks from previous years means […] Read more

Virginie and her father Bernard Lepage.

Building an organic oat supply chain for the future

In English, this Quebec farm’s name means to make speed upwind. No wonder

Reading Time: 6 minutes Surrounded by her parents, sister and brother, Virginie Lepage has a strong grip on Ferme Olofée, Quebec’s biggest organic oatmeal producer and processor. How big, you ask? In other words, how big can an organic oatmeal operation be? Well, annual sales are $9 million. That should answer some questions. This clearly is a young entrepreneur […] Read more


(Sundown001/iStock/Getty Images)

Oats market steady, watching harvest

Reading Time: < 1 minute MarketsFarm — Western Canada’s oats market is stable at prices a bit better than a year ago, as harvest gets underway and participants wait to see how much will move off the combine to the market. Early yield reports range anywhere from 80 to 140 bushels per acre, said Tyler Palmer, grain buyer with Emerson […] Read more

David Kaminski, a field crop pathologist with Manitoba Agriculture, urges producers to be aware of nearby streams when picking oat varieties, thanks to the prevalence of common buckthorn, a wild host for crown rust.

Wild host a thorn in the side for oat growers

Common buckthorn is a haven for crown rust spores over the winter and an easy source of infection if the farmer opts for a susceptible oat variety

Reading Time: 2 minutes Oat growers may want to gauge the distance to the nearest woody stream bed the next time they choose a variety. That’s one of the messages sent out during this year’s Crop Diagnostic School in Carman in the first two weeks of July. Why it matters: Manitoba’s most popular oat varieties have either been downgraded […] Read more