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Alberta railway stations get a new lease on life Moving the old buildings was a challenge, and much renovation still needs to be done

Last July movers hauled the huge 162x20-foot Bassano station 155 kilometres over two days to Beiseker. Submitted photo

By Johnnie Bachusky af contributor /innisfail

A

trio of Alberta communities are welcoming back a pioneer symbol of hope and prosperity that gripped early settlers across the western landscape more than a century ago.

Benalto, Beiseker and Scandia are restoring old Canadian Pacific train stations to their former glory. They hope the icons will revitalize their communities with additional public services and increased tourism dollars.

The west-central Alberta hamlet of

Benalto reclaimed its train station, originally built in 1928 and moved out to the Red Deer area in 1971, to become the centrepiece for its 100th anniversary celebration next June.

Beiseker purchased the 102-year-old Bassano station and hopes to have it ready in 2014 as its new museum for western Canadian railway equipment.

Scandia has turned the 103-year-old dilapidated Jenner station into a theatre and gathering place at the hamlet’s historical park.

Benalto’s original modest centennial plans were dramatically changed

see RAIL STATIONS } page 6

SEED ROYALTIES:

Beiseker acquired the Bassano station after outbidding Scandia’s Eastern Irrigation District Historical Park. Photo: Johnnie Bachusky

Soon be collected when you sell grain? } PAGE 3

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news » inside this week

inside » COOL gaining U.S. opponents Ritz says about 100 senators sign appeal

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

livestock

crops

columNists

Doug Sawyer reflects

Staying ahead of pea diseases

38

Border collies headed for the unemployment line?

Robotic milkers, so why not robotic herders?

11

An Australian perspective on GE coexistence

22

Daniel Bezte Various predictions for winter weather

EU trade treaty could be costly Dairy farmer loss seen at $150 million a year

brenda schoepp

32

Roy Lewis ABP president steps down after two years

36

Ascochyta can cut yields 20 to 50 per cent

17

Strawberry foot rot on the increase in feedlots

37

There’s gold in them thar grain bags, says NGO Heavy, high-quality plastic can be repurposed into mulch pads for trees and garden transplants

Herds well enough, but doesn’t fit next to you in the front seat of the truck.

R

esearchers at the University of Sydney in Australia have developed a robotic herder which they say does a better job than humans or dogs.

A four-wheeled device nicknamed Robotic Rover has successfully herded dairy cows in tests on the university’s dairy herd.

“Removing human judgment from trafficking speed will allow us to ensure that cows are only ever herded at a pace that is comfortable, even for the slowest cows,” a background document on the Robotic Rover says.

So far, Rover has been operated remotely by a human but researchers think it could be automated.

According to a BBC story, researchers were amazed at how easily cows accepted the presence of the robot. They were not fazed by it and the herding process was calm and effective, they said.

Because the robot moved in a steady manner it allowed cows to move at their own speed which was important in reducing lameness among cattle, Kendra Kerrisk, dairy researcher and associate professor, told the BBC. Robotic Rover can be seen in action at http:// www.youtube.com/ watch?v=AQXJbYDGvPg and http://www.youtube. com/watch?v=-75Xz-1JxmU http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=S4Dndp-Esd8#t=58.

Based on comments on an Australian farm publication website, not all farmers are convinced about robotic superiority.

“Bet the diode warmer doesn’t even lick your hand when your best cow dies, your wife leaves, or the bank forecloses,” said one.

PHOTo submitted

By Daniel Winters staff

O

ld, used grain bags are big, bulky and present a disposal headache for farmers.

But for Rodney Sidloski, the CEO of Weyburn, Saskatchewan-based HELP International, they are a potential gold mine.

“We can potentially see a retail value of up to $4,000 out of a bag that brand new only cost the farmer about $1,000,” said Sidloski. “Imagine that, from a recycled product.”

With the help of a handful of interns from foreign universities who assist a number of agroforestry-related projects at his eight-acre site, Sidloski has developed a streamlined process for turning the bags

into long-lasting mulch pads that can prevent weeds and grasses from choking out newly planted tree seedlings.

In the past six weeks, he and his team have repurposed about 20 bags by cutting them into two-foot squares with an x-shaped slit in the middle for the tree to grow up through. Because they are made from such high-quality, heavy plastic, the pads make newly planted trees virtually maintenance free for up to 20 years, he said.

In researching the idea, he has even found that at $2 each, the plastic squares compete favourably with a similar product made from shredded rubber tires that cost about $18 each, and much more in terms of effort and energy to recycle.

“You can make 2,000 pads from one single grain bag

that are of much higher quality,” he said, adding that he is exploring a Canadian and United States patent for the idea and has arranged marketing and distribution across the Prairies through an undisclosed retail chain this spring.

The mulch pads will be marketed to appeal to urban landscapers and gardeners planting single trees, but not farm shelterbelts. They also work well for transplanted garden crops such as tomatoes, he added.

“We think the government could be a bit more visionary in protecting the environment and promoting industry, rather than spending money to send valuable products out of the province to be recycled in a really environmentally unfriendly way,” said Sidloski.

Resembling a beached whale when full of grain, grain bags weigh nearly 182 kg empty and are made of a high-quality polyethylene plastic.

At 10 mm in thickness, they are twice as thick as regular construction vapour barrier, and almost as heavy-duty as pond liner.

Slit open, they are about 10 metres wide and up to 107 metres long, and contain an average of 2,700 square metres of very useful material that has “101 uses,” said Sidloski.

“It’s unbelievable, really.

There are all kinds of industries that require plastic membranes. It doesn’t have to be sent out to Alberta and melted down,” said Sidloski. daniel.winters@fbcpublishing.com

3

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Ritz says Canada to sign on to international seed treaty You could soon be paying royalties when you sell the grain, not when you buy the seed

T

he federal government is poised to sign on to an international treaty that could see farmers paying seed royalties when they sell their crop.

Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz says the government intends to ratify UPOV ’91 by Aug. 1, 2014.

UPOV ’91 is the acronym for the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants, which was struck in 1991. Previous Canadian governments failed to pass legislation enacting UPOV ’91 in 1992 and 1998.

Speaking to the Canadian Seed Trade Association’s semi-annual meeting in Winnipeg Nov. 13, Ritz said UPOV ’91 will provide plant breeders with a better return on investment and encourage more private-sector investment into developing new varieties.

“We’re looking at time frames in the parliamentary calendar and that’s the best date we have so far working with the House Leader’s office to get it on the agenda after we come back from Christmas break,” Ritz said, triggering applause.

“That still gives us opportunity and time to get it in place for the next crop year.”

End-point royalties

The pros and cons of UPOV ’91 have been hotly debated in meeting rooms and hallways as the grain sector seeks ways to encourage more private company research, especially in cereals.

UPOV ’91 paves the way for “end-point royalties,” collected when farmers sell their grain.

Some farmers say paying a royalty based on what they produce, instead of the seed they buy, reduces their risk. If they harvest a poor crop, they pay less with an end-point royalty, whereas now they pay up front when they buy seed or herbicides linked to the seed.

However, critics fear UPOV ’91 could prevent farmers from saving seed, resulting in higher production costs.

Ritz told reporters the same people who oppose UPOV ’91 also criticize Ottawa for not spending enough on varietal research. “You can’t have one without the other in my estimation,” he said.

“The biggest howl would be farmers can’t save seed. Well, they can’t save seed now if they sign a contract. It would be the same situation under UPOV ’91.

There’s still the ability to save seed. If you sign a contract you have to honour the contract.”

Breeder control

UPOV ’91 allows farmers to save seed if the government authorizes it, National Farmers Union president Terry Boehm said in an interview. But it also gives plant breeders the right to control their varieties through the entire production, processing and retail chain.

“We’re going to fight this,” Boehm said. “This is just a big sell-out to the biggest corporations in the world.

“The Canadian Seed Trade Association would prefer total

“If we’re going to end up paying this $3 or $5 a tonne between levies and royalties, do we want to have some say in what comes out of that or do we just want to feed somebody else?”

DON DEWAR MANITOBA WHEAT AND BARLEY ASSOCIATION

Who should pay?

Most everyone agrees more investment is needed, especially in wheat. But views vary on who should pay.

The NFU says the federal government should, as it traditionally has. Boehm said private company research is inefficient.

He said one study shows only 10 per cent of company earnings from seed sales goes back into research, whereas publicly funded research has a 12:1 return.

Don Dewar, interim chair of the proposed Manitoba Wheat and Barley Association, said Ottawa has been cutting research. Meanwhile, farmers in countries such as Australia, have been spending more.

“If we really want to increase investment we need to have a way for the developers to get a reward for their work,” he said.

“And one of things in UPOV ’91 allows them to do that. But you could do it with a contract too.”

But if farmers invest more because of UPOV ’91 they should also discuss the merits of owning all or part of the resulting varieties, Dewar said.

“Do we want the canola system or do we want the farmers to own part of the system?” he said.

“If we’re going to end up paying this $3 or $5 a tonne between levies and royalties, do we want to have some say in what comes out of that or do we just want to feed somebody else? It’s not that farmer owned will be cheaper seed, but you’re going to provide some competition and have some input on what you get.”

UPOV ’91 allows farmers to save seed, Dewar said. “It’s just that you have to keep paying for the technology every time you use it.” allan@fbcpublishing.com

Consultation on variety registration reforms coming to a head The PRCWRT’s working group proposes a number of changes to streamline the wheat registration process

BY ALLAN DAWSON STAFF

I

mplementing UPOV ’91 is one way Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz hopes to encourage private investment in plant breeding — the other is reforming Canada’s crop variety registration system.

Last year Canada exported a record $47 billion in agricultural products, Ritz told the semiannual meeting of the Canadian Seed Trade Association in Winnipeg Nov. 13.

“Many of those dollars depend on an efficient and responsive and effective varietal registration system,” he said. “There’s no question the system has delivered for the industry and for Canadian farmers over the years. Today by developing consensus on next steps we continue to build on that success.”

The consultation process began in February when Ritz asked chairs of the committees that recommend new varieties for government registration to propose ways to streamline the system. Citizens were also invited to submit their views.

“We still have people in different camps (on variety registration), but we’re probably very close (to a position),” CSTA president Peter Entz said in an interview after Ritz spoke.

Critics says the current system, especially for registering new wheats in Western Canada, takes too long, delaying and even preventing farmers from accessing new, higher-yielding wheats.

Supporters say the process is important for maintaining Canada’s high-quality wheat brand. They say it also protects farmers and end-users from bad varieties.

“There are people who say we should’ve done it three years ago and others who say we should never do it,” Ritz told reporters.

A working group struck by the Prairie Recommending Committee for Wheat, Rye and Triticale (PRCWRT) has proposed a number of reforms for wheat registration, including shortening pre-registration trials by one year and instead collecting 24 site-years of data over three years.

Other proposals include: • Making up to four site-years

of foreign data acceptable if collected in from U.S. states adjoining Prairie provinces; • Dropping the priority disease assessments to five from seven — fusarium head blight, leaf, stem and stripe rusts and common bunt; • The committee as a whole, which now votes on every candidate cultivar, would automatically endorse candidates receiving ‘Do Not Object’ or ‘Support’ at evaluation team level meetings; • Candidates not supported by all three teams would be referred to the Cultivar Voting Panel as opposed to the whole 75-member committee. The voting panel would consist of seven representatives from each team, plus representatives from the Canadian Seed Trade Association and Canadian Seed Growers Association.

The proposals are being reviewed by the PRCWRT, and if ratified, could be in place when the committee meets in Winnipeg in February. allan@fbcpublishing.com

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STAFF

control over seed and Ritz is essentially facilitating this through UPOV ’91. It makes it possible for a cascading (royalty) rate.”

CSTA president Peter Entz said Ritz’s decision on UPOV ’91 “is very significant.” UPOV ’91 “is very farmer friendly,” added Entz, who is also Richardson International’s assistant vice-president of seed and traits.

The association has also been facilitating industry discussions on ways for variety developers to get a better return on their investments, including changes to Canada’s variety registration system.

©2013 UFA Co-operative Ltd. All rights reserved.

BY ALLAN DAWSON

11/13/13 2:17 PM

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NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

EDITOR Will Verboven Phone: 403-697-4703 Email: will.verboven@fbcpublishing.com

Reporters Alexis Kienlen, Edmonton (780) 668-3121 akienlen@fbcpublishing.com

SSRP has no plan for commercial agriculture

Jennifer Blair, Red Deer (403) 396-2643 jennifer.blair@fbcpublishing.com

PRODUCTION director Shawna Gibson Email: shawna@fbcpublishing.com

Director of Sales & Circulation

More irrigated land development not favoured by government

Lynda Tityk Email: lynda.tityk@fbcpublishing.com

CIRCULATION manager Heather Anderson Email: heather@fbcpublishing.com

national ADVERTISING SALES James Shaw Phone: 416-231-1812 Fax: 416-233-4858 Email: jamesshaw@rogers.com

classified ADVERTISING SALES Sharon Komoski Phone: 1-888-413-3325 Fax: 204-944-5562 Email: sharon.komoski@fbcpublishing.com

ADVERTISING Co-ordinator Arlene Bomback Phone: 204-944-5765 Fax: 204-944-5562 Email: ads@fbcpublishing.com

PUBLISHER Lynda Tityk Email: lynda.tityk@fbcpublishing.com

Associate PUBLISHER/ editorial director John Morriss Email: john.morriss@fbcpublishing.com

president Bob Willcox Glacier FarmMedia bwillcox@farmmedia.com 204-944-5751

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By will verboven

Alberta Farmer | Editor

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he last few years has seen the Alberta government working through a laborious process to create long-term development plans for specific watershed areas of the province. The idea is to establish a governing process that will oversee how resources such as agriculture, ranching, energy, recreation, transportation, conservation, tourism and others will develop in the various regions.

It’s a necessary process for all sectors involved both for their development and protection. It’s not just a technical process, but involves regional economics and of course politics and vested interests. The latter is always disconcerting because citybased lobby groups will be quick to expand their influence over the outcome. Those groups also represent a large voter base that puts the much smaller farming and ranching community at a political disadvantage.

The planning is a long-term process that can drag out for years, with draft plans, public consultations, revised plans, legislation and finally implementation.

The first plan out the gate was the Lower Athabasca Regional Plan. That area received priority simply because it involved the major economic driver in the province — the oilsands. Clearly the government wanted to make sure it was going to protect the development of that titanic asset over any other concerns. That rush to get that plan into place saw agriculture, which is a significant player in the southern end of the plan’s region, virtually ignored. That oversight was acknowledged, but it still does not seem to have been adequately addressed.

The next plan to be released was the draft South Saskatchewan Regional Plan (SSRP).

Unlike the Lower Athabasca plan, agriculture and ranching could not be ignored, as they contribute billions to the economy of southern Alberta.

However, considering its huge contribution and the obvious large physical presence

of commercial agriculture and ranching in the entire area, its development vision within the draft SSRP document was downplayed. Most of the other sectors reviewed had suggestions and recommendations for some sort of developmental action. For instance new parks and protected areas are to be expanded, tourism and recreation are to be developed, and more environmental conservation is to be pursued.

Those may be admirable development goals, but they are not the main economic drivers of the southern region. The energy sector is addressed in the plan, but it is a mature sector in that area and the industry just wants to maintain its access rights and the status quo. It’s the commercial and irrigation agriculture which receive short shift in the plan. It’s as if the elephant in the room was being ignored as the authors of the document laid out the direction that they wanted for the region, which did not reflect the agricultural economic reality.

To be fair, livestock grazing in the green and white areas was reviewed, but more from a grassland conservation perspective than an economic opportunity. The document recognized the role grazing plays in preserving the ecosystem, but failed to recommend ways to stop the loss of grasslands by brush and noxious weed encroachment.

In many foothill areas that has seen 30 per cent of the grazing land lost since the 1900s.

It’s curious that in a document that wants action taken to preserve more parks, riparian areas and headwaters it makes no mention of conserving and renovating grasslands to their original condition.

The SSRP does make some reference to the elephant — the role of irrigation in commercial agriculture. However, the tone tends to be one of looking at it as a relic from past development of the area. Incredibly an SSRP suggestion is that farmers’ markets be expanded, that’s a rather naive perspective for a local ag economy that is dominated by multimillion-dollar commercial operations growing and processing vast tonnages of food products.

There is not a word about significantly

expanding irrigation to pursue further development of commercial agriculture.

Reference tends more towards increasing the efficiencies of existing irrigation infrastructure and practices. Well that is already occurring, the industry has seen a whopping increase of 19 per cent in water use efficiency over the past few years. Water pipelines are replacing many feeder canals and low pressure pivots are in widespread use. That all helps with water conservation and has seen some small incremental expansion, but it doesn’t open up 10,000 acres of new land to irrigation development. A few years ago the provincial government blocked the development of Crown land for a large irrigated potato operation. That would indicate that this government will not allow any further such large-scale irrigated agriculture development, the draft SSRP seems to reflect that government attitude.

It would seem that the direction of this plan reflects an urban-centric perspective of resource conservation and recreation development with undertones of political correctness. For instance, consultation with First Nations about land development is stated (many times) as a main criteria in any future implementation of the plan.

Although such consultation may have interesting historical impact perspectives, it should not be an attempt to thwart development. Considering treaties were signed over 100 years ago, such consultations seem at the least a bit late.

Lobby group perspectives as expected are varied. Conservation and green groups feel the plan is short sighted and want even more parks and protected areas. Some offroad recreation groups feel their access to the backcountry will be restricted. Hunting and fishing groups are concerned about access. Cities and towns will want their water sources protected and expanded.

With those kinds of perspectives looming in the background, perhaps the best commercial agriculture and ranching can hope for in these resource development plans is to be ignored and be allowed to carry on business as usual.

Bison return has real concerns P

arks Canada recently released a proposal to reintroduce bison to restricted areas of Banff National Park. The detailed process outlines a multi-year program to establish a breeding herd of about 100 head. If the plan is successful bison will be further reintroduced into other areas of the park.

Stakeholder groups were consulted including the local ranching community which borders areas near where the bison would be released. Most groups were supportive, but there were some serious concerns expressed by area ranchers.

Those concerns were the roaming of bison outside the park boundaries onto adjacent cattle grazing leases, the transmission of diseases from bison to cattle, and Parks Canada response to disease outbreaks.

The last point is of particular note as it refers to what can only be described as a lackadaisical and perhaps even obstructionist attitude that Parks Canada has shown in dealing with the ongoing diseased (mainly brucellosis) bison in and around Wood Buffalo National Park.

Those bison have drifted southward, and

have been found close to agricultural areas. The federal government has had at least 80 years to deal with that ongoing disease threat to the cattle industry, but to this day seems resistant to take any appropriate action. If that is its attitude towards dealing with free-roaming diseased bison, then the fears of ranchers near the proposed release area are serious indeed.

Park officials state that only disease-free bison from the Elk Island National Park herd will be released. Be that as it may, stuff happens and there is no provision in the proposal that reintroduced bison will all be destroyed if any disease is found in the new Banff herd. The Alberta cattle industry would probably feel better about Parks Canada intentions with this reintroduction proposal if they took some real action in dealing with the diseased bison that they already have in the Wood Buffalo Park area.

The other concern is that reintroduced bison would begin to roam outside Banff Park. The plan proposes to erect major fencing to prevent that from happening along with GPS collars on all the animals

to keep tabs on them. None of that will stop a hungry herd of bison stampeding towards lush grazing land outside the boundaries. All of that is going to cost a lot of money — add in program managers, biologists and consultants and this project could easily cost millions.

Taxpayers should note that the plan is to restrict the bison to areas that are not readily accessible to the public. That’s not a way to get sympathy from citizens when they can’t see what they are paying for.

Ironically, Banff Park for almost 100 years had an enclosed bison paddock near the townsite that was a significant public attraction. It was similar to the existing one at Waterton National Park. However, in 1997 it was torn down by Banff Park officials for not being natural enough.

Maybe so, but it was a tremendous venue for public education and goodwill about bison.

One suspects that this plan will be implemented, but it would sure be more fair to see it better address some of the legitimate concerns of the ranching community.

5

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Draft development plan seems incomplete, says WSGA The draft plan seems to be full of broad outcome statements, but detail is lacking Western Stock Growers’ Association

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he Alberta Government has released the draft South Saskatchewan Regional Plan (SSRP), the second of seven regional plans for the Land Use Framework. The stated purpose of the SSRP is to set out a template to effectively manage growth and development across the entire region to see the economy of all sectors grow. This is no small feat considering the number of different industries on the land, the fact that 1.6 million people live in the region and the need to sustain the integrity and diversity of the landscape. In fact, the development of such an ambitious plan is a staggering project.

The document itself is over 150 pages but it is what is not contained in those pages that has the Western Stock Growers’ Association (WSGA) concerned.

The draft plan seems to be full of broad outcome statements,

but there is detail lacking in how the government hopes to achieve them. Instead of setting out a clear detailed plan of how they hope to achieve these outcomes, the document defers to various frameworks, plans or strategies; most of which don’t exist yet. It’s how these frameworks, plans and strategies within the SSRP are put into practice on the land that will impact the ranchers. The document just seems incomplete.

One thing the draft plan is clear about is the expansion and creation of parks and conservation areas. The amount of protected area in the Eastern Slopes was increased by 50 per cent of the existing protected area, from 22 per cent to 33 per cent.

Curiously, the plan does not increase the protected area in the southeast corner of the province with the exception of a slight increase to the area of Writingon-Stone Park. This corner has received a lot of attention in the last few years because of the natural short-grass prairie ecosystem

and the several species at risk it supports. Most recently, this area has an emergency protection order for the greater sage grouse imposed on it under the federal Species at Risk Act. We can only speculate on the reason for leaving this area of the province virtually untouched by the draft plan. Would this pave the way to implement the Plan for Parks? Would this make it easier for Nature Conservancy Canada to buy bigger easements?

It’s a wait-and-see game.

The draft plan also addresses the high recreation pressure in the Eastern Slopes of the region, calling for the creation of offhighway trails, random camping sites and also the enhancement and expansion of fully serviced camping sites. These types of projects are expensive. One wonders where the government will find the money to pay for these when they have blasted through over half of the budget already.

Put all this in the context of still having five more regional plans to build, each of which will require

money to implement. The question of how the government can afford the Land Use Framework may very well become the elephant in the room.

In addition to building more recreation infrastructure, the plan calls for longer-term leases for recreational facilities (pg. 65).

The reason behind this is to offer better security for lessees which results in a stronger interest in investing in and maintaining the facilities.

Parallels can definitely be drawn between recreational leases and grazing leases. A longer term on grazing leases will increase security so the lessee can justify investing in the maintenance and improvement of the ecosystem.

But there is no mention of longer grazing-lease terms in the plan.

Without a doubt the Eastern Slopes in southwestern Alberta are home to some of the most stunning landscape in the province.

What many don’t understand is that the reason the landscape is so amazing is due to the stewardship

efforts of the ranchers and land managers — a service they have been supplying for free. The draft plan commits to the development of market-based instruments for ecosystem services. It is great to see the government step up and acknowledge the importance of this public service our ranchers have been supplying but the success of such instruments is very dependent on the design of the program. Just handing out incentive dollars is not going to work.

It’s not sustainable. If a market is built around ecosystem services with a sound plan and a sustainable buyer, it will take care of itself and at a much less cost to the government. Unfortunately, the details on what these market-based instruments are is not included in the plan.

Overall, the plan does not give enough detail to judge whether it’s good or bad. It’s in how it plays out on the ground where we will find out how it affects the people who are on the landscape every day.

Handling deadstock continues to pose problems with SRMs ABP says much of the problem has been downloaded to rural municipalities Alberta Beef Producers

A

lberta Beef Producer’s deadstock subcommittee recently presented its deadstock handling report to the board of directors. The deadstock issue in Alberta has been a concern since BSE reduced the pickup service from farms for rendering. About 75,000 tonnes of cattle carcasses are produced in Alberta every year and about half of this is picked up for rendering, but the rest is left to the elements for disposal.

The industry has become somewhat frustrated with this arrangement. Prior to BSE, West

Coast Reductions covered most pickup costs due to its ability to produce fats and meat and bone meal that were sold back into the system. Now only fats can be rendered and the rest of the material is classified as specified risk material (SRM) that goes into a private landfill near Coronation, and producers shoulder the cost of any pickup. This has meant reduced business for the renderers and a headache for producers.

The recent assessment and review dealt with Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), Alberta Environment, West Coast Reductions and others that could add to the present

state of affairs, primarily from a legal point of view. Recent Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development (ARD) literature was assessed and referenced, and advantages and disadvantages of various ways to deal with deadstock, including costs and dealing with SRM, were addressed. Natural disposal, community pickup, incineration, carcass burial, rendering, composting and thermal hydrolysis were reviewed.

Producers look at this as an extra expense after an animal has already been lost, maybe $800 to $1,200 or more. Any disposal pickup might cost at least $75 extra and biosecurity risk still con-

tinues. Natural disposal doesn’t do much for containing prions that cause BSE, or most viral or bacterial disease organisms.

It seems that much of the problem has been downloaded to municipalities. Cardston County put up a state-of-the art composting system and it looks after pickup. There is still the issue of what to do with the compost and because it is still considered SRM it can’t be put onto farmers’ fields or pastures. The MD of Ranchlands and Cypress Hills have provided some costs towards rendering pickup and this cost goes back to the local taxpayers.

Incineration would look after

the biosecurity issue, but there is a cost. This isn’t just burning but getting temperatures up to 850°. A private project being planned for the province uses thermal hydrolysis that is a combination of high temperature and high pressure. Byproducts can be pulled from this system because they are no longer classified as SRM. These can go into a sales stream that could defray the costs of pickup, processing and product distribution, even producing a profit stream. The big problem with this is finding $15 million to finish the project.

A copy of the ABP report is available on the website or by calling the office.

Pain issue an opportunity for proactive industry response Waiting for more research alone isn’t the answer, says Ed Pajor of the University of Alberta Meristem Land and Science

D

r. Ed Pajor serves as part of the animal care team at Calgary Stampede.

It seems every few months there are more case studies that emerge on why agriculture needs to become more proactive in managing animal welfare issues.

The recent W5 investigative report, “Behind the barn door,” is one high-profile example

that hits home for Canadian livestock industries. The often highly emotional and polarizing debate around gestation stalls is another.

Scanning the environment, another issue that is clearly rising in profile is pain management.

Among the many signs of this trend, one example in the U.S. is a recent large-scale, activist-driven social media campaign, that has emerged against California Pizza Kitchen, targeting dehorning practices.

Another sign, this time in Europe, is a new website launched on alternatives to pig castration. It showcases how EU countries are talking seriously about voluntarily moving away from pig castration altogether and are already conducting complex, well-funded studies into the options and implications.

It is on this rising issue of pain management that Canadian livestock producers and their industries have an important opportunity, says leading ani-

mal welfare expert Dr. Ed Pajor of the University of Calgary faculty of veterinary medicine.

That opportunity is to learn from the experiences with welfare-related issues that have damaged animal agriculture’s image in the past. Then, use this knowledge to develop better, more proactive approaches on pain and other challenges that are likely to become increasingly important in the months and years ahead.

“Pain, for example, is no longer just an emerging challenge,” says

Pajor, a researcher and professor of animal behaviour and welfare who works with and advises industry in numerous capacities both domestically and internationally.

“It is a challenge that is here today that we’re going to have to address in the very near future.

There’s a great deal of pressure coming from other places in the world. It’s an issue that people can really understand, even if they are well removed from agriculture, and we need to be prepared.”

6

Off the front

november 25, 2013 • Albertafarmexpress.ca

RAIL STATIONS } from page 1

When the Benalto train station finally returned home in 2013 hundreds of emotional citizens were awaiting its arrival. Submitted photo

The Benalto station was moved to the hamlet from Red Deer in 2013 to a large green space, the hamlet’s former CP lands, which will ultimately be renamed Centennial Station Park. Photo: Johnnie Bachusky

The Jenner station as it appeared before the Eastern Irrigation District (EID) Historical Park restored it. Submitted photo

The restored Jenner train station at Scandia’s Eastern Irrigation District (EID) Historical Park. Submitted photo

a year ago when Red Deer’s Garett and Brenda Cupples offered to give back the station for free.

“How do you say no to that?” said Dave More, chair of the hamlet’s centennial committee.

But while reclaiming the station came at no cost, there was a price to move it. An even bigger question was where would the committee put the 64x22-foot twostorey relic.

That was answered quickly when Benalto’s Bill and Dale Speight, owners of the town’s former CP Rail lands, donated green space near Main Street. The committee, helped by a successful media campaign, then quickly raised the necessary $32,000 to move the station 37 kilometres from Red Deer to Benalto.

On April 24, the station was brought home. A crowd of up to

Beiseker had eyes on another community’s pioneer icon — the huge 162x20-foot Bassano station. After several years of planning, the central Alberta historical society secured the station in a bidding war for $10,000.

Last July, it was moved 155 kilometres to the village over two days and placed south of the old Beiseker station, which houses the village’s office and museum for local history.

While there are great expectations for the new museum, society officials still have to do extensive renovations and solve a high water table problem at the site. Even still, they hope to have the new museum at least partially open by spring.

“We have a lot of interest. We actually have a lot of CP people that at one time or another did

300 citizens gathered in Benalto to welcome the return of its station.

“They brought it from the west end, through the trees and led by five young women on horses,” said More. “There was not a dry eye on the whole street. It was quite an amazing moment.”

More is hoping the station, which will undergo extensive renovations this winter, will at least be partly ready for the June centennial celebrations. Ultimately, the site for the icon will be renamed Centennial Station Park, a gathering area for the hamlet and symbol of renewed prosperity.

Big moving job

While the hamlet was welcoming its original station back, officials from the Alberta 2005 Centennial Railway Museum Society in

work in the Beiseker area,” said society treasurer Fred Walters.

“It’s going to mean quite a bit.

The good part is that it’s going to increase our tourism.”

When Beiseker officials were bidding on the Bassano station, they were up against the hamlet of Scandia’s Eastern Irrigation District (EID) Historical Park.

Scandia, located 34 kilometres southwest of Brooks, did not get the Bassano landmark but in early 2011 park officials heard the old Jenner station, lying derelict in a farmer’s field for more than 40 years, was available. “It was in very bad shape when we got it,” said park president Rosalind VanHal. “The owner said they thought the people who owned it before them had plans to fix it up and live in it. It never happened.

It just stayed there.”

The park acquired it in exchange for $10,000 worth of tax receipts.

With the help of a $230,000 provincial grant and another $70,000 from the EID, the park was able to move the 24x45-foot two-storey Jenner station 115 kilometres to Scandia and then restore it.

The old station, which sits in the shadow of the “Sleeping Giant” — a preserved 1920s-era Alberta Pool Elevator — now houses a 27-seat theatre, a venue that will soon feature a film on Carl Anderson, one of the pioneers of the EID. “It is beautiful. Everybody in the community says the same thing,” said VanHal, adding renovations are still required for the station’s second floor.

“Everybody who comes through is amazed at what we’ve accomplished.”

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Ontario reeling as Heinz to shut ketchup plant H.J. Heinz Co. announced Nov. 14 it will shut its factory at Leamington, southeast of Windsor, plus two U.S. plants and shift production to other plants in Canada and the U.S. The decision will affect 740 Heinz employees as well as tomato growers who will be told the company has no plans to buy from them in the coming season.

Growers are to find out by Dec. 1 whether the closure affects them, Heinz said. As of 2011, the company had contracts with 46 independent producers, growing tomatoes from Heinz seed on about 5,500 acres.

7

Albertafarmexpress.ca • november 25, 2013

After Washington GMO label battle, both sides eye national fight Strong early support in the polls was quashed by industry advertising

By Carey Gillam reuters

B

oth sides of the costly and high-stakes GMO labelling battle in Washington state say they see an even bigger national fight ahead despite the apparent defeat of the mandatory labelling measure by Washington state voters.

The measure died 47.05 per cent to 52.95 per cent, according to preliminary results. The loss followed a similar defeat last year in California when a ballot initiative there also failed to pass.

The measures in Washington and California had early strong support in polls. That support ebbed as food and agricultural industry players poured millions of dollars into advertising campaigns spelling out what the industry groups said were deep flaws in the proposed laws. A consortium that includes General Mills, Nestlé, PepsiCo, Monsanto, and other corporate giants, contributed roughly $22 million to kill the labelling law.

Despite the Washington loss, proponents pushing for labelling on food made from genetically modified crops cite progress in 20 other U.S. states, particularly in Massachusetts, New York and New Hampshire. They say they will also turn up the pressure on federal lawmakers and regulators.

The 2016 presidential election is a prime target for more ballot initiative efforts due to higher voter turnout, they say.

“We’ll keep bringing the fight until they give in,” said David Bronner, who has contributed more than $2 million to the labelling effort through a California organic soap company he owns.

“The commitment of our movement... is huge and growing.”

Opponents of labelling say they do not want to keep waging a multimillion-dollar, state-by-state fight against mandatory GMO labelling. Any labelling should be voluntary and follow standards set at the federal level as state-by-state labelling could create costly problems for food manufacturing and distribution channels, they say.

The commitment of our movement... is huge and growing.

create the false impression that biotech foods are harmful.

“We absolutely support the consumer’s right to know,” said Robb Fraley, chief technology officer at Monsanto, the world’s largest seed company. “But we can’t support misleading labels that infer there is something unsafe about biotech products.”

Proponents of labelling fear the food and biotech agriculture companies will seek a federal ban to pre-empt more state labelling efforts. But they continue to express confidence in long-term victory.

“There is growing consumer outrage and backlash,” said Dave Murphy, executive director of Food Democracy Now, a consumer group that supports labelling. “We are going to wear them down. We are going to win.”

An employee stocks produce near a sign supporting a ballot initiative in Washington state that would have required labelling of foods containing genetically modified crops at the Central Co-op in Seattle, Washington.

The campaign lost. PHOTo: REUTERS/Jason Redmond

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The Grocery Manufacturers Association, (GMA) which represents more than 300 food companies, is funding efforts in 25 states to defeat labelling measures. The group is pushing for a “federal solution that will protect consumers by ensuring that the FDA, America’s leading food safety authority, sets national standards for the safety and labelling of products made with GMO ingredients,” GMA CEO Pamela Bailey said in a statement.

Officials at Monsanto, which spent more than $5 million to kill the Washington measure, say labelling supporters are trying to

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11/12/13 1:13 PM

8

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Classroom Agriculture Program needs more volunteers

WHITE REAPPOINTED TO CWB

Volunteers are farmers, ranchers, agri-food experts, government members or others with agriculture experience

BY KAREN SPELAY GENERAL MANAGER, CLASSROOM AGRICULTURE PROGRAM

M

any children don’t connect milk, eggs, and vegetables with the cows, chickens and crops in Alberta, and they don’t understand the role that agriculture plays in their daily lives. The Classroom Agriculture Program (CAP) helps children learn about the food they eat, where it comes from and the importance of agriculture in this province.

Volunteers with an interest or experience in agriculture deliver these messages to Grade 4 students across Alberta. With strong growth in requests from schools for CAP presentations, more people connected to the farm are needed to share their knowledge and experience with these children.

CAP was launched as a way to bring a strong, positive message about agriculture into classrooms. Since 1986 CAP has reached hundreds of thousands of students. Last year about 20,000 children were registered for the program. The hour-long presentation is delivered by dedicated CAP volunteers. These volunteers are farmers, ranchers, agri-food experts, government members or others with agriculture experience. This network of volunteers delivers the program between February and June of each year.

Presentations include storytelling, hands-on props and fun activities. CAP provides training, ideas, resources and guidance to all volunteers. “The prep work was not excessive and lots of latitude in content is encouraged. The presentations went terrific and we both (the students

and myself) got a lot out of the sessions,” said Darold Niwa, key account manager UFA and CAP volunteer.

CAP success relies on the involvement of people who are dedicated to preserving and promoting agriculture. CAP is endorsed by the minister of agriculture and the minister of education. CAP supporters include Agriculture for Life, Agrium, Alberta Barley Commission, Alberta Beef Producers, Alberta Canola Producers Commission, Alberta Chicken Producers, Alberta Institute of Agrologists, Alberta Irrigation Projects Association, Alberta Milk, Alberta Pulse Growers Commission, Alberta Veterinary Medical Association, Alberta Wheat Commission, Eastern Irrigation District and the Egg Farmers of Alberta. To register go to www. classroomagriculture.com.

Ian White has been reappointed president and chief executive officer of CWB Ltd. for a two-year term, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said last week. “Mr. White has shown exceptional leadership during a time of significant transition for the CWB. He has my full support and confidence in continuing to lead the CWB as a voluntary marketing option for farmers during the transition period and in the preparation of a privatization plan.” White, who first joined CWB in 2008, convenes over a five-member board of directors appointed by the federal government.

NEWS New international no-till online forum Seed Hawk has announced the launch of NO-TILLville, a global forum for farmers, researchers, agronomists, and others in the agricultural community who share a desire for soil conservation through modern no-till seeding practices.

“When I look back on my experiences growing up on the farm seeing the effects of soil erosion on the land, I understand how important no-till practices are in decreasing soil erosion,” Patrick Beaujot, one of the founders of Seed Hawk, said in a release. “As my parents, brother and I moved our family farm over to no-till seeding practices, we saw how productivity could be improved while increasing profitability and providing benefits to the environment.”

NO-TILLville is a site where the no till community can follow and chat with global experts and researchers in no till, who will be blogging about current issues and trends in no-till. Users will be able to share their experiences with the global community, ask questions, and seek answers to their particular challenges in the discussion forums. The site will be set up with agronomic, equipment and regional forums initially covering Australia, Canada, the United States, Europe and Russia.

NO-TILLville will officially launch to the global no-till community at Agritechnica in Hanover, Germany, Nov. 12-16.

The forum can be found at www.notillville.com, and is an ad-free site. Seed Hawk said that as a founding sponsor, it hopes that the website will inspire a growing community of like-minded individuals, companies and organizations to help spread the no-till word throughout the world.

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ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Global food prices rise in October after five months of falls Sugar costs had been delayed in Brazil, prompting the price rise

BY CATHERINE HORNBY ROME / REUTERS

G

lobal food prices rose slightly in October after declining for the past five months, the United Nations food agency said Nov. 7, forecasting more stability in markets as it raised its estimate for 2013-14 cereals output.

The rise in prices last month was fuelled by sugar costs, which increased due to concerns about harvest delays in Brazil. Prices of wheat and edible oils also strengthened, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said.

“Prices are settling around these levels,” FAO senior economist Abdolreza Abbassian told Reuters by telephone. “I do not see such

sharp declines in prices in coming months as we have seen in the first half of the year,” he said.

FAO’s index measuring monthly price changes for a basket of cereals, oilseeds, dairy, meat and sugar, averaged 205.8 points in October, up 1.3 per cent from September and hitting its highest level since July.

Food prices surged during the summer of 2012 due to a major drought in the United States but prospects for a rebound in cereal production to record levels have weighed on prices this year.

In its biannual Food Outlook report published Nov. 7, FAO said food markets were becoming more balanced and less price volatile than in recent years thanks to bigger supplies and a recovery in inventories.

FAO raised its forecast for world cereal output in 2013-14 to 2.498 billion tonnes, about 10 million tonnes higher than its estimate in October.

It increased its estimate for world wheat output in 2013-14 to 708.5 million tonnes from a previous forecast of 704.6 million tonnes.

World cereal stocks at the close of seasons ending in 2014 are now seen at 564 million tonnes, higher than a previous estimate of 559 million tonnes and up 13 per cent from their opening levels.

FAO said it had revised its data for the food price index and had extended records back to 1961.

The revised index still shows a record peak was hit in February 2011, when high food prices helped drive the Arab Spring

PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa.

In the summer of 2012 the index began surging to levels

close to another peak seen in 2008, when several poor countries experienced riots, some of them deadly.

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November 25: Cow/Calfenomics 2013, Regional Centre 9:30 am, Vermilion. Call: AGINFO 800387-6030 November 25: UFA Grain/Canola Storage Seminar, Exhibition Park 9:45 am, Lethbridge. Call: Jenn 403-570-4503 November 26: AWC & ABC Region 1 Meeting, Holiday Inn 9:00 am, Lethbridge. Call: Kristina 780-718-5023 November 26/27: CANFAX Cattle Market Forum, Deerfoot Inn, Calgary. Call: Canfax 403236-7529 November 28: AWC & ABC Region 6 Meeting, Community Centre 9:00 am, Sexsmith. Call: Cole 403-219-6253 November 28: Canola Growers Fall Meeting, Seniors Rec Centre 9:00 am, Oyen. Call: Rick 780-678-6167 November 28: Cow/Calfenomics 2013, 1714 Mayor Magrath Drive 9:30 am, Lethbridge. Call: AGINFO 800-387-6030 November 28: Canola Growers Fall Meeting, Canadian Legion 9:00 am, Vegreville. Call: Rick 780-678-6167 December 2/4: Alberta Beef Producers AGM, Sheraton Cavalier, Calgary. Call: ABP 403-275-4400 December 3: Canola Growers Fall Meeting, Lethbridge Lodge 7:30 am, Lethbridge. Call: Rick 780-678-6167 December 3/4: 2013: Farming Smarter Conference, Lethbridge Lodge, Lethbridge.

Call: Jamie 403-381-5118 December 3/5: Grow Canada Conference 2013, Hyatt Regency Hotel, Calgary. Call: GC 416-622-9771 December 4/6: Alberta Barley Producers AGM, Banff Springs Hotel, Banff. Call: Cole 403219-6253 December 9/11: Canadian Forage & Grasslands Assoc.

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NEWS » Markets

10

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

China rejects U.S. GMO corn

Canadian offer lowest in Iraq

China rejected a cargo of U.S. corn because it contained a genetically modified variety that is not approved for import, a trade source said last Monday. The shipment contained Syngenta’s Agrisure Viptera corn, also known as MIR 162, the source said. The GMO discovery comes at a time of surging U.S. corn imports. For that reason, analysts say the matter will be quickly resolved. “It is a minor hiccup in what will otherwise be a smooth import process. They need our corn, they’ve got the orders already placed. We don’t think this is the start of some long-term major disruption,” said Rich Nelson, chief strategist with Allendale, Inc. — Reuters

Canadian wheat was offered at the lowest price of $345 a tonne c. & f. in Iraq’s tender to purchase a minimum 50,000 tonnes of milling wheat which closed Nov. 17, European traders said. The offer was made for 100,000 tonnes. Offers were to remain valid until Nov. 21. The lowest offer for Australian wheat was 150,000 tonnes at $349.29 and the lowest offer for U.S. wheat was $369.44 a tonne for 50,000 tonnes, traders said. The tender had sought supplies from Australia, the United States and Canada only. — Reuters

Big supplies still sit heavy on canola values U.S. wheat futures may be finding a bottom

Basis opportunities could start coming forward from any line companies in need of canola in short order. photo: canstock photo inc.

By Phil Franz-Warkentin

I

CE Futures Canada canola held rangebound for the most part during the week ended Nov. 15, but dropped sharply on Friday to settle with losses overall.

The January contract tested the psychological $500-per-tonne level a couple of times during the week, but never managed to settle above that chart point. A firmer tone in the outside vegetable oil markets, including CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) soyoil and Malaysian palm oil, was also supportive. However, Canada’s recordlarge crop continues to overhang the market, with any attempts at moving higher being met with increased selling and a downturn in demand.

The next resistance comes in at around $505 if canola manages to bounce above $500, but it will take

a weather scare in South America or some other similar outside influence to spark a rally as most factors are pointing down for the time being.

First and foremost, Canada grew a record-large canola crop this year that was likely over 16 million tonnes.

Farmers are storing what they can in hopes of getting better prices down the road, but end-users are well aware of the big supplies and will need that outside catalyst in order get more aggressive in their buying.

Second, South America is in the middle of planting its latest soybean crop, and conditions so far look close to ideal for a possibly record-large crop.

The U.S. soybean harvest is nearing completion. Farmers there will also store what they can, but supplies are still relatively large.

Ongoing uncertainty in the global economy is yet another bearish influence overhanging the commodity mar-

kets in general, although any resulting weakness in the Canadian dollar would serve to limit the impact on canola prices.

Wheat moves lower

In the U.S., soybeans, corn and wheat all posted losses for the week. For beans and corn, the declines were tied to profit-taking after initially moving higher. News the U.S. was considering reducing its ethanol mandate, which would lead to a reduction in demand for corn as a feedstock as well, put further pressure on corn.

The three U.S. wheat contracts, meanwhile, have been trending lower for the better part of the past two months and remained stuck in that trend.

However, there were signs that the wheat futures were starting to find a bottom, with U.S. prices said to be looking more favourable interna-

tionally once again. Short-covering was also starting to come forward in wheat.

Soyoil and oats were the two bright spots in the U.S. grain and oilseed markets during the week. Oats supplies are relatively sufficient to meet the demand, but logistical issues getting the crop into delivery positions were keeping it propped up so far.

The relative strength in soyoil was linked in part to the strength in the Malaysian palm oil market. Good export demand for the tropical oil kept prices near their highs for the year, while the possibility of supply disruptions due to the damage caused

by Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines was also underpinning that market.

Phil Franz-Warkentin writes for Commodity News Service Canada, a Winnipeg company specializing in grain and commodity market reporting.

11

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Dairy farmers face major income loss from European trade deal The Dairy Farmers of Canada estimates milk quota will have to be cut by more than two per cent, and producers will collectively see an annual $150-million drop in income

By Alex Binkley

af contributor / ottawa

T

he proposed trade deal with Europe could cost Canadian dairy producers $150 million a year in lost income, according to the Dairy Farmers of Canada.

Details of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) are still being hammered out and it’s expected to be two years before the deal is ratified by the European Union’s 28 member nations. But once in effect, European cheese makers would receive an additional tariff-free access of 18,500 tonnes over and above the current 13,471 tonnes they’re allowed.

Translate that back into milk production and the impact on Canadian dairy producers is “much more significant than what has been reported,” Dairy Farmers president Wally Smith told the Commons agriculture committee.

“The loss to the dairy farmers is real,” Smith said. “The additional access is equivalent to a 2.25 per cent cut in farm quota, representing a farm income loss of nearly $150 million a year.”

That’s equivalent to the entire milk production of Nova Scotia, he noted.

Ottawa has promised to compensate those affected and the Dairy Farmers of Canada has begun discussions on that issue, said Smith.

“DFC is trying to work with the government to ensure that there is no impact on Canadian dairy farmers and cheese makers,” he said. “In spite of all the negative emotion amongst Canadian farmers resulting from the CETA agreement, the DFC leadership is intent on engaging in constructive dialogue with government to mitigate the negative impact to our industry.”

It was initially estimated that while the deal would allow Europe to capture one-third of the “fine cheese” market in Canada, it would amount to just four per cent of the overall cheese market. But Smith said that if the entire tariff-free quota is used, the EU will capture 7.5 per cent of the Canadian cheese market.

And it will be riding on the coattails of the marketing efforts of Canadian dairy farmers, he added.

“The domestic cheese market has been a priority market segment with a yearly strategic investment totalling $30 million dedicated to developing this market across Canada,” Smith said.

“Over the last decade we have invested heavily into developing and growing the specialty cheese market, and we have been successful. What has happened, by giving that access to the European Union, not only are you costing the farmers directly on their income, and having to reduce production, you are also taking away the investment that’s been made to grow that speciality market.”

It will also have a wider economic impact as the Canadian dairy sector accounts for 218,000 jobs, and pays more than $3 bil-

lion in local, provincial and federal taxes annually, according to DFC. The organization also dismissed any idea that more Canadian cheese might head across the Atlantic. Canada has been unable to fill the existing dutyfree quota of 4,000 tonnes of aged cheddar and to match the highly subsidized European milk prices Canadian farmers would have to sell their milk to processors at $28 a hectolitre, said Richard Doyle, the group’s executive director.

“Quite frankly, not a single producer in this country, based on our cost of production, could actually recover their cash costs,” he said. “No return on investment and no return on labour.”

DFC president Wally Smith says if the entire tariff-free quota is used, the EU will capture 7.5 per cent of the Canadian cheese market. PHOTo: thinkstock

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NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Getting youth involved key to winning, says speaker Tech-savvy youth around the world are out of work, and that spells opportunity

BY DANIEL WINTERS STAFF / BRANDON, MAN.

W

hat can agricultural societies do to rejuvenate their membership and help rebuild a sense of community in rural areas?

Think of yourselves in a new light and reach out to youth on their terms, says Peter Male.

Male took that message to the recent annual general meeting of the Manitoba Association of Agricultural Societies and spoke of how that approach revived his organization, the Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver.

“In the end, really what you are is a socio-economic force that can affect the economy and the social lives of the people around you,” said Male, the exhibition’s vice-president of sales. “That is a powerful thing to be.”

Male was given the job of finding new attractions and year-round bookings to keep the 110-yearold venue “busy” when he was hired in 1997. It was no easy feat, with a long-standing operating agreement with the city about to be phased out, the local NHL and CFL teams moving to new stadiums downtown, and the province questioning whether it should be in the fair business.

“The place was in a state of chaos. Change was overwhelming it,” he said.

Like many small-town agricultural societies, management had to face the facts and decide where its future might lie. The organization didn’t focus on its infrastructure (six massive buildings, livestock barns, and an amusement park), but instead searched for one “powerful” fundamental principle that would guide change.

“What are we in this marketplace?” said Male. “The common denominator was that we were a gathering place.”

“Bringing people together” became the guiding principle and was key to the revival of the exhibition, which now generates $40 million in revenue from 1,800 event days each year.

That approach is something ag societies in rural Canada need to consider and they should also look at how current trends can be harnessed, Male said.

Volunteer source

For example, unemployed youth and those only able to find parttime work are a rich, untapped vein of volunteer manpower, he said.

But to bring them in, ag societies have to step outside their comfort zone and allow youth to participate in ways they want to — which today means digital and Internet technology. But it can lead to surprising and exciting outcomes, Male said.

For example, officials at the Walker Art Gallery in Minneapolis weren’t expecting much when they agreed to host an event screening silly YouTube videos of cats. But throngs of people showed up, many bringing their pets or dressing up as cats. There was also enthusiastic participation in a sculpture contest for cat carvings made out of butter and lard.

“They expected 300 to 400 people to show up, but the thing exploded on them,” said Male.

“The entire crowd was chanting, ‘Cats, cats, cats!’”

The event ended up drawing 12,000 people, who paid $25 each to attend, and the Internet Cat Video Film Festival, originally devised as a means of maintaining event continuity at a time when their theatre was under renovations, is now booked solid until June 2014 for showings in Europe and Japan.

The older generation is the foundation of ag societies, but it can’t be an “island unto themselves,” and must find ways to engage youth, said Liz Roberts, superintendent of the provincial organization.

That may mean that a new event or initiative doesn’t have to be directly agriculture related, she said. “(The PNE) is an agricultural society. Look at how they have rejuvenated themselves,” she said.

There is a tendency to do the same things over and over, while hoping for a different result, said Marlene Baskerville, the Manitoba association’s executive director.

“You know the coffee shop talk: The world is a mess. They should do something,” said Baskerville.

To bring communities together, ag societies have to reflect the interests of the target groups, she said.

“If YouTube or short videos or whatever is the thing, how can a community create an opportunity for that to happen?” she said.

It’s easy to bemoan the fact that today’s youth spend every waking hour staring into glowing screens, she said.

But if technology is their current obsession, then maybe there’s potential for bringing it into the

Engage youth through digital technology. community event mix, through texting contests or organizing spontaneous “flash mobs.”

“You can’t problem solve your way into the future,” said Rob-

PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

erts. “Instead of seeing problems that need to be solved, we have to start seeing possibilities.” daniel.winters@fbcpublishing.com

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13

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Israeli agri-tech firm aims for big boost in crop yields Genome doubling process occurs naturally in plants but can dramatically increase yields patents worldwide. Independent experts contacted by Reuters declined to comment on the work, saying they did not have enough details.

In a tour of Kaiima’s experimental crop fields in northern Israel, company officials displayed examples of what they said were crops improved by its new technique.

Doron Gal, Kaiima’s chief executive officer, said that by 2050, farmers will need to meet the “daunting challenge” of producing 70 per cent more food than they do currently to sustain a growing world population.

Kaiima, the Hebrew word for sustainability, said that by 2016 it expects to be able to deliver to growers the basis for producing seeds for enhanced wheat, corn and rice for food and castor for biofuel and biopolymer production.

Israel is considered a world leader in agricultural technology development with irrigation techniques, hothouses and computerized animal feeding systems

BY ORI LEWIS AND RINAT HARASH

MOSHAV SARONA, ISRAEL / REUTERS

A

n Israeli enterprise which aims to boost global crop yields without the aid of genetic modification will sow its first commercial seeds within three years, the company pioneering the technique has told Reuters.

Seed technology firm Kaiima Bio-Agritech says it has developed a way to greatly speed up the multiplication of the genome of crops, known as genome doubling, without changing their DNA, or genetic fingerprint.

It is as if a piece of string were thickened into a rope by adding more fibres of the same material, making it stronger and more durable. In agriculture, it means enhancing seeds so that they produce more plentiful and robust crops.

Kaiima has kept secret how it has achieved its breakthrough and says it has filed a number of

among leading exported products, the Israel Export Institute said.

Income from agri-tech exports in 2011 amounted to $3.4 billion, out of a total of $91.7 billion in Israeli exports for that year, according to official figures.

Kaiima, founded in 2007, said in September that it had raised some $65 million in equity from international investors. It does not have any plans for an IPO in the foreseeable future.

“Our plan is for this funding to finance our operation through 2016 when we are going to be able to bring our product to the market... we will produce seeds together with partners that will be similar in price to regular seeds,” Gal said.

Enhanced crops

Genome doubling evolves in nature, but only over thousands of years. Scientists have been trying since the 1940s to speed up the process, but had not been able to avoid damage to a crop’s core characteristics.

DestineD for greatness

Gal said Kaiima had managed to achieve a crop’s stability by respecting the integrity of its original DNA. Kaiima expects that its technology will result in an initial 25 per cent improvement in crop yields.

Asked by Reuters about Kaiima’s breakthrough claim, five experts in the field of agricultural genetics at leading Israeli academic institutions declined to comment, saying they did not have enough information about the company’s work.

One scientist confirmed Gal’s statement that attempts to speed up genome doubling had been tried for decades, but added that neither he nor any other researcher he knew of had managed to unlock the secret for doing it successfully.

Stronger plants have been developed during genome doubling attempts in the past, but Gal said their lack of genetic stability meant they could not produce seeds for subsequent generations.

Kaiima’s main centre is based in a cluster of portable cabins in a farming community in northern Israel’s agricultural heartland.

The company has taken over a number of fields at various locations in the area for its crop experiments.

In its rice crop trial, Kaiima planted seed variants and breeders picked out the best results to continue laboratory work on the most successful strains.

Alon Lerner, Kaiima’s senior breeder, displayed an enhanced yield of bigger plants and grains.

He said they had received the same amount of water and nutrition as crops to which the technology had not been applied.

Kaiima’s recent injection of cash has come from three new investors: Horizons Ventures, which manages the private technology investments of Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing, the World Bank’s private-sector arm International Finance Corp. (IFC) and Infinity Group, a China-focused private equity fund.

It also received new funds from existing investors that include DFJ, DFJ-Tamir Fishman, Mitsui, KPCB, Oberlee and Musea Ventures.

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A researcher stands in an experimental rice field belonging to seed technology firm Kaiima Bio-Agritech, near Kfar Tavor in northern Israel. Kaiima says it has developed a way to greatly speed up the multiplication of the genome of crops, known as genome doubling, without changing their DNA, or genetic fingerprint.

PHOTO: REUTERS/BAZ RATNER

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A researcher at seed technology firm Kaiima Bio-Agritech holds two corn seedlings, one that he says was not modified (l) and one after modification (r), at the firm’s laboratories in Sarona, in northern Israel October 21, 2013.

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An employee of seed technology firm Kaiima Bio-Agritech holds a rice stalk in an experimental field near Kfar Tavor, in northern Israel October 21, 2013.

14

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Alberta to repurpose CWB-related trust fund

A NEW MISS RODEO CANADA

Three other agriculture-related acts among obsolete legislation to be repealed STAFF

A

scholarship trust formed in Alberta using surplus money from the original 1919 Canadian Wheat Board will shift to oversight by the province’s Heritage Scholarship Fund.

The provincial government announced the move as part of a list of obsolete legislation it plans to repeal.

Among that legislation is the Wheat Board Money Trust Act, which set up a board of trustees to oversee the administration of a fund left from money not distributed from the first CWB, which operated for one year as a transition to the open market after the First World War. It remains at about $120,000 and is used to provide scholarships totalling about $5,000 per year.

The money will shift to the Alberta Heritage Scholarship Fund, the province said Nov. 6.

It will then continue to be used to fund scholarships for students in post-secondary agriculture programs.

Among the 24 other acts and statutes slated for repeal are: • The Crop Liens Priorities Act, in which one remaining provision establishes a crop lien in favour of the Agriculture Financial Services Corp. (AFSC) as the “priority recipient” of any claims or liens on any amount payable to them for crop insurance. That act duplicates a provision in the Agriculture Financial Services Act, thus is not required, the province said.

• The Alberta Wheat and Barley Test Market Act, introduced as a private member’s bill in 2001 as a way to “break the monopsony of the Canadian Wheat

Board,” which instead was broken last year by federal Bill C-18.

• The Stray Animals Amendment Act of 2005, in which two provisions map out the form of publication of information in a notice when livestock are impounded. Livestock Identification Services (LIS), which administers the program, has its own set of forms and processes to notify animal owners so “there is no need for this to be further regulated,” the province said.

While some Alberta statutes up for repeal duplicate more up-todate legislation, the government also plans to pull some laws such as its Masters and Servants Act, which “serves no purpose in the modern legal environment, as it has essentially been replaced by the Employment Standards Code.”

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ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Brazil government figures confirm spike in Amazon deforestation Satellite data shows a reversal in the progress towards protecting the world’s largest rainforest

BY PAULO PRADA

RIO DE JANEIRO / REUTERS / STAFF

D

eforestation in the Amazon increased by nearly a third over the past year, according to Brazilian government figures released Nov. 14, confirming a feared reversal in what had been steady progress over the past decade against destruction of the world’s largest rainforest.

Satellite data for the 12 months through the end of July showed that deforestation in the region climbed by 28 per cent compared with a year earlier.

Although scattered, the total land cleared during the period amounted to 2,256 square miles (5,843 square km), an area bigger than Prince Edward Island.

The figure, boosted partly by expanding farms and a rush for land around big infrastructure projects, is the second-lowest annual tally since Brazil’s space agency began tracking deforestation. But it fulfilled predictions by scientists and environmentalists, based on preliminary figures compiled through the year, that destruction was on the rise again.

“You can’t argue with numbers,” said Marcio Astrini, coordinator for the Amazon campaign at the Brazilian chapter of Greenpeace, the environmentalist group. “This is not alarmist — it’s a real and measured inversion of what had been a positive trend.”

Brazil tracks the amount of land cleared each year as part of its efforts to protect the Amazon, a western European-sized jungle that is an abundant source of the world’s oxygen and fresh water and considered by scientists to be a crucial buffer against climate change.

The measurement year for the satellite data starts each August, during the Amazon dry season, when overhead imagery is freest of clouds.

The reasons for the rebound in deforestation are numerous.

Changes to Brazil’s forestry laws have created uncertainty among landowners regarding the amount of woodland they must preserve. High global prices for agricultural commodities have also encouraged growers to cut trees to make way for farmland.

Loggers, squatters and others are also rushing to exploit land around big infrastructure projects, including railways, roads and hydroelectric dams under construction in the Amazon.

Izabella Teixeira, Brazil’s environment minister, dismissed criticisms that government policies had led to the increase.

She pointed to the long-term decrease in deforestation over the past decade and said the overall trend was “positive.”

The government’s goal, Teixeira told a news conference in Brasilia, “is to eliminate illegal deforestation in the Amazon.”

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A military policeman walks past trunks of trees recently cut illegally from the Amazon rainforest, inside Jamanxim National Park near the city of Novo Progresso, Para state. Initial data from Brazil’s space agency suggests that destruction of the vast rainforest — the largest in the world — spiked by more than a third over the past year, wiping out an area more than twice the size of the city of Los Angeles. PHOTO: REUTERS/NACHO DOCE

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ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

IRRIGATED CROP UPDATE CONFERENCE

AF STAFF / RED DEER

K

nowledge is power in the fight against two common pea diseases.

“The more you know about these things that are trying to take a bite out of your crop and your wallet, the better off you’ll be when it comes to trying to manage them,” Alberta Agriculture plant pathologist Michael Harding said at the recent Alberta Pulse Growers/Alberta Barley Growers joint meeting in Acme.

“Anyone who’s grown peas probably knows as well as anyone about what root rots look like and what ascochyta mycosphaerella looks like in the field. They’re very commonly occurring.”

Ascochyta

Of the two diseases, ascochyta is most common — and most devastating.

“Twenty to 50 per cent yield losses are not that uncommon in pea fields in Alberta due to this disease,” said Harding.

“Because it’s so commonly occurring and causes such significant losses, this is really one of our No. 1 production constraints for peas.”

The foliage disease is both seed- and airborne, and appears as tan or grey lesions on the leaf and stems that can turn black as they grow. These lesions reduce photosynthetic capacity, resulting in reduced seed weight, size and number. Sometimes, the disease affects the lower part of the canopy as well.

“When that happens, you might not see a direct improvement in the actual seed yield from a fungicide application,” said Harding.

“But if the disease is causing a lot of problems low in the canopy, it causes lodging, which reduces the harvestability of the crop.”

Because ascochyta can survive in the soil and infected crop residues, managing stubble and having an adequate crop rotation is critical.

“A three- to four-year break of susceptible

Ascochyta symptoms — 20 to 50 per cent yield losses are not uncommon due to this disease. PHOTO: THINKSTOCK crops is really a foundational principle of management for this disease,” said Harding. “The organism can survive in the soil, but the levels of inoculum that exist in the soil are going to drop with time.”

Using disease-free, treated seed will also reduce the impact of ascochyta, said Harding.

“If we’re using bin-run pea grain seed and it has a lot of ascochyta on it, we’re increasing the risk of seeing that disease show up early. The earlier it shows up, the more difficult it is to manage.”

A timely fungicide application can keep the disease pressure down, as well. Harding looks at four factors to help determine if a fungicide application is warranted: the canopy, the humidity, the symptoms and the weather. But even if producers do everything right, the risk of ascochyta outbreaks remains high.

“It’s pretty rare that we’re ever going to see a season in Alberta where we don’t have this showing up in pea fields,” he said.

Root rots

Root rots are becoming more of a problem.

“There are pea fields in Alberta now that are becoming absolutely devastated by root rots,” said Harding.

The disease limits the ability of roots to take up nutrients and water, causing yellowing and wilting in the canopy and discolouration of the main tap root and feeder roots.

Yield loss can be difficult to estimate but can be extreme in some cases, particularly in warm, wet soils.

“Any time where we get prolonged moisture and warm soil conditions, that really is just stoking the fire for these organisms to cause serious damage on roots,” said Harding.

Choosing fields that have low incidence of disease reduces the risk.

“If you have a significant amount of root rot on a pulse crop in a field, I wouldn’t put peas in there the next year. That would be asking for trouble.”

It’s also wise to not plant peas in fields that are heavy clay, heavily compacted or have poor drainage, he said.

Rotation can only reduce, not prevent, issues with root rot.

“Rotation only gets us so far because these organisms exist everywhere regardless of what crops we grow,” said Harding. “But by rotating away, the really aggressive pathogens will fall back down to a basal level.”

Choosing high-quality, high-vigour seed helps as well.

“There really isn’t anything we can do once the seed is put in the ground to protect that seed, so using good-quality, high-vigour seed is important,” said Harding, adding seed treatments can also help plants maintain their vigour.

Regardless of whether producers are seeing root rots or ascochyta in their fields, promoting good plant health is essential to reducing the risk of these diseases in Alberta pea fields.

“The healthier the crop, the more likely we are to be able to weather the storm and manage the disease situation in pea crops,” he said.

proving ground.

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The

Disease levels in next year’s pea crop can be managed by making the right decisions when it comes to seed choice, rotation and fungicide application

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18

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Analyst gives U.S. Congress a 50-50 chance of passing Farm Bill in 2013 With no new law, the existing bill could be extended or parity pricing legislation of 1938 might be reinstated

BY CHRISTINE STEBBINS MINNEAPOLIS / REUTERS

T

he chances of the U.S. Congress passing a five-year Farm Bill by year’s end are a little better than 50-50 given the gridlock over food stamps for the poor, a top farm policy expert said November 11.

“There is a slightly better chance than 50-50 that we will get a bill rolled into a budget at the end of the year. But it’s no better than that,” Barry Flinchbaugh, a Kansas State University agricultural economist who advises legislators shaping the U.S. Farm Bill, told Reuters on the sidelines of a farm bankers’ meeting in Minneapolis.

The Farm Bill, already a year behind schedule, is the master legislation that directs government

supports for farmers and food aid programs.

The bill is now with a conference committee of 41 members of Congress who are hammering out the difference between the House and Senate bills. The biggest difference: the Senate wants a $4-billion cut from food stamps while the House wants to reduce the program by $40 billion.

“Food is the only division. The other issues can be settled,” said Flinchbaugh, citing variations in how they address crop insurance for farmers along with other subsidies.

Historically, the conference committee reconciles differences and brings a compromise to a final vote. That process has been hampered by the deep divisions between the Republican-controlled House and the

Senate, where Democrats are in the majority.

“There is a way perhaps we can get past this food stamp gridlock.

We cut food stamps $6 billion to $8 billion and then we put in all these caveats the far right wants to put in the food stamp program, like work requirements and drug tests,” said Flinchbaugh, who has advised on farm policy for over 40 years.

The government extended the expired 2008 Farm Bill last year.

Leaders of the House and Senate agricultural committees have a self-imposed deadline of reaching agreement by Thanksgiving and the White House has threatened to veto a bill with large food stamp cuts.

If Congress fails to pass a new bill, a second extension is likely, Flinchbaugh said.

“There is some talk we will do

that for two years because we don’t want to be messing with this during an election year,” Flinchbaugh said. “Or, we implement the permanent legislation.”

Without a new law, U.S. farm policy will be dictated by an underlying 1938 permanent law that would bring back the concept of “price parity” which led to sharply higher guaranteed crop prices, Flinchbaugh said.

“It’s normally been the safeguard to push the Congress to act,” Flinchbaugh said. “But I’ve never seen a Congress like this one. So it’s very hard to predict.

“Consumers are the biggest losers without a Farm Bill,” he added.

Given the impasse on this Farm Bill — which traditionally has had bipartisan support — some farm analysts are suggesting this could be the last Farm Bill, ending 80

years of U.S. farm policy designed to protect farm price and income.

“If we remove food and nutrition bills from the Farm Bill this is the last one,” Flinchbaugh said.

“If we keep the consumer-farmer coalition together there will be future Farm Bills.

“There are 400 urban districts in the House of Representatives and 35 rural districts. When you’re a minority like farmers — granted they are a potent minority because they produce food — but you remove nutrition and food stamp programs from the Farm Bill, the leverage is over.

“Another thing, if you take food stamps and nutrition programs out of the Farm Bill you’re removing about 85 per cent of USDA’s budget. Can USDA survive with 15 per cent of its budget? Likely not,” Flinchbaugh said.

Clinton Ziegler inducted into 4-H Hall of Fame

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linton Ziegler of Vegreville is the newest member of the 4-H Alberta Hall of Fame in recognition of his contribution to youth mentorship.

Ziegler first joined 4-H as a beef club member in 1961. For the past 25 years, he has served as a leader and volunteer at the club, district, regional and provincial 4-H levels. He has also been actively involved in his community through the Boy Scouts, hockey, Alberta Wheat Pool, the local fire association and his church.

“The 4-H program relies on dedicated volunteers who selflessly give of their time to mentor and guide our youth in learning new skills and growing as future leaders. Mr. Ziegler’s strong sense of community and commitment to helping young people exemplify the exceptional qualities that Hall of Fame recipients are well known for,” said Verlyn Olson, Alberta minister of agriculture and rural development.

The 4-H Alberta Hall of Fame has inducted 80 members since 1971. Candidates are nominated by peers and leaders from local 4-H organizations and are evaluated based on their personal qualities, demonstrated leadership, community references and contributions to 4-H, agriculture and rural life. The selection committee includes representatives of the 4-H Council of Alberta, the 4-H Foundation of Alberta and Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development.

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ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

EU prepares new GMO maize cultivation approval If it goes ahead, the insect-resistant maize would become only the second GM crop to be approved for production in the EU

BY CHARLIE DUNMORE BRUSSELS / REUTERS

T

he European Union is on course to approve cultivation of a new type of genetically modified maize for the first time in more than a decade, according to a draft proposal from the bloc’s executive seen

by Reuters.

The proposal was drawn up after Europe’s second-highest court in October blamed the European Commission for lengthy delays in the approval process for the insect-resistant maize, developed jointly by DuPont and Dow Chemical.

The commission was expected to send the proposal to EU ministers for approval in November.

Even if governments fail to decide, as is expected, the commission will have the power to grant approval by the end of the year.

While it is unlikely that the crop would ever be widely grown in Europe, where GMO cultivation remains a tiny fraction of the global total, the proposal will face fierce opposition from environmental campaigners, skeptical consumers and some EU governments.

The move could also revive a stalled debate over draft EU legislation to allow individual governments to decide whether to ban cultivation of GMO crops that have been approved at EU level.

An EU approval request for maize variety 1507, sold outside Europe under the Herculex brand name, was first submitted in 2001. But a series of safety assessments carried out in response to objections from some countries delayed the process for more than a decade.

The October court ruling forced the commission to act, a spokesman for the EU executive said, and according to the bloc’s GMO legislation the next stage in the approval process is for EU ministers to take a vote.

The proposal is likely to face opposition from governments including France, Austria and Poland, while those in favour could include Britain, Spain and Sweden.

Butterfly fears

A spokesman for DuPont’s seed unit Pioneer Hi-Bred, which is leading efforts to commercialize 1507, said the company had not decided whether to mar-

ket the product in Europe if it is approved.

“The European Union has a legal obligation to itself, to its farmers and scientists and to its trade partners to follow the revised EU biotech legislation and support the approval of safe agricultural biotechnology products,” Pioneer’s European communications manager Jozsef Mate said in a statement.

Environmental campaigners said the EU had failed to address concerns over the impact of the insecticide-producing crop on butterflies and other pollinators, and urged the commission not to formally adopt the

proposal at a meeting next Wednesday.

“Blindly rubber-stamping this GM maize would be a reckless decision by the commission, p utting biotech companies ahead of public safety,” said Marco Contiero of Greenpeace.

Repeated EU scientific assessments have revealed no safety concerns over the product, but under the approval decision drawn up by the commission, companies marketing the crop in Europe would have to monitor its impact on butterflies and other “non-target” insects.

Only one other GMO crop is currently grown in Europe — another insect-resistant maize

variety developed by Monsanto and approved in 1998. It is cultivated on about 100,000 hectares mainly in Spain, as well as Portugal, the Czech Republic, Romania and Slovakia.

Seven EU countries have put in place emergency bans on growing the Monsanto variety: Austria, Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy and Luxembourg.

Outside Europe, GMOs are grown widely across North and South America and parts of Asia.

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20

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Indian Head reeve accuses Ritz of sabotaging agroforestry centre’s chances Millions of trees go unharvested after all proposals to ensure continued operations are rejected

PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

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BY DANIEL WINTERS STAFF

M

illions of tree seedlings at the AAFC Indian Head Agroforestry Centre are likely to remain in the ground this fall after all proposals to ensure continuity of operations at the shelterbelt nursery were rejected by the federal government.

Norm Hall, president of the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan, who also serves as the spokesman for the Western Canada Tree Nursery Coalition, said Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz rejected the coalition’s business plan submitted in August because it called for $1.6 million in bridge funding.

“That’s what we were pushing for: Get the place leased, get the order forms out, get the harvest done, and just continue the program,” said Hall, adding that the funds requested amounted to half a year’s operating costs.

“He said, ‘Come back to us when you are serious,’” said Hall.

Hall said Ritz broke his pledge earlier this year that he would ensure that the 112-year-old agroforestry centre continues to supply trees on a cost-recovery basis to landowners in Western Canada after the federal government divestiture.

Lorne Scott, the reeve of the RM of Indian Head, which is also a member of the coalition, fears closing the nursery is a foregone conclusion. He accused Ritz of sabotaging efforts to save the shel-

terbelt nursery and then laying the blame for its failure on the RM. “Ritz has been telling the media that the RM of Indian Head is running the centre,” said Scott. “But no, the RM is not looking after the nursery.”

“Barring a miracle, I can’t see the facility surviving. It appears that it was designed to fail and shut down.”

LORNE SCOTT

Scott added that the RM isn’t in a position to fund its continued operations, nor has it been authorized to take it over.

“Barring a miracle, I can’t see the facility surviving. It appears that it was designed to fail and shut down,” said Scott.

Shipped out

Scott noted that specially designed equipment is being shipped off to other AAFC sites across the country, tree order forms were removed from the agroforestry centre’s website earlier this fall, virtually all the employees have been laid off, and no one answers the phones.

The research aspect of the operation, which Ritz had originally

promised would be preserved, may also be threatened.

“The guys in research are up in the air. They are not sure where they are going to be in six to 18 months,” said Hall.

Rodney Sidloski, CEO of Weyburn-based non-governmental aid organization HELP International, was one of 10 bidders reportedly vying to take over the shelterbelt nursery. Its proposal was rejected, even though Sidloski believes that HELP was the only one with actual reforestation experience.

He said that the delayed harvest won’t hurt the trees, but not having inventory ready for next year’s planting season might cripple efforts to keep the centre afloat.

“We don’t understand why the federal government isn’t allowing us as a public service organization to take a lease of the centre, harvest the trees, and take care of things, including a spring sale,” said Sidloski.

Volunteers ready

As for the harvest, Sidloski claims to have a team of volunteers ready to get to work within 48 hours.

“We’re ready to move in and harvest even today, but the longer we wait, the tougher the logistics will be to get the trees out of the ground,” he said.

HELP International, which operates its own 300,000-tree nursery on an eight-acre site, is dedicated to producing “two-penny trees” to “save the world” by controlling erosion, creating wildlife habitat and remediating polluted sites.

With research and aid projects operating both in Canada and Kenya, it has worked with dozens of landowners and planted hundreds of thousands of trees on farmland edges along the Souris River in a privately funded project since 2000, and has developed a low-cost system for propagating cuttings in styrofoam containers on farm dugouts.

With no forms available for ordering trees, and the RM not authorized to allow anyone else to do the harvest, sorting and storage of this year’s crop, Sidloski also said that Ritz appears ready to abandon the entire operation.

“We’re already producing a fifth of their production. We would love to get hold of that centre,” said Sidloski. “It’s so undercapacity. In the mid-1980s, it was producing 12 million trees a year.”

As planned

An emailed statement from Ritz’s staff said that federal government involvement at AAFC Indian Head is ending Dec. 31 “as planned.”

After that, it continued, “AAFC will continue to perform minimal field maintenance” until the completion of the disposal process, which will be undertaken in an “efficient, equitable and transparent manner” to ensure “best value for the taxpayer.”

“The government has been clear that no funding will be provided to pay for any group to assume ownership over the tree farm,” it stated. daniel.winters@fbcpublishing.com

21

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Alberta shelterbelt program still going strong

SCENES FROM THIS YEAR’S ROYAL WINTER FAIR

Orders for spring 2014 are already underway, and all orders will be taken until April 1 AGRI-NEWS

A

lberta Nurseries has been working in conjunction with the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration (PFRA) for the past 17 years, growing and dispersing tree and shrub seedlings for the establishment of shelterbelts and other agroforestry, conservation and reclamation projects on eligible agricultural lands. Spring 2013, marked the end of an era, as due to budget cuts in the federal government, this was the last season to receive trees from the PFRA. “The Alberta Shelterbelt Program however, continues to operate and Alberta Nurseries is confident in meeting the perpetual needs of residents in Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, with their extensive facilities located in Bowden, Alberta,” says Alyssa DeGray with Shelterbelt Services. “We have the experienced staff and facilities to deliver quality seedlings. Our horticulturists and environmental technicians are also available to provide extension services where needed.”

The benefits of shelterbelts are numerous. Shelterbelts reduce wind speed, creating necessary microclimates. On average, a mature five-row shelterbelt, with at least two rows of conifers, planted around a farmhouse will reduce its heat requirements by 25 per cent. As well, the trapped snow provides water for dugouts and soil reserves, and the treed areas provide wildlife habitats and add biodiversity.

There are 30 different types of trees, hedges and fruits that can be purchased through the program.

Everything is sold in bundles of 10 for $23 per bundle. The seedlings are all sized at about one foot tall.

Trees can be ordered online or by calling 1-403-224-3544. Orders for spring 2014 are already underway, and all orders will be taken until April 1. Trees are on a firstcome first-served basis, so early ordering is advised. Trees will be delivered in May 2014.

“Wherever people build dwellings, one of the first things they turn to is planting trees for shelter, shade and beauty,” adds DeGray. “The longevity of the Alberta Shelterbelt Program is a testament to these and the many other benefits of trees.”

1 Excellent

Top: Opening ceremony for the TD Canadian 4-H Dairy Classic.

There is a flag for each province represented (Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and P.E.I.) and a placard for every county club.

Middle: Morgan Barnes of Haldimand County, Canfield took the champion oat sheaf award. The competition is sponsored by 4-H Ontario, Grain Farmers of Ontario and the Ontario Forage Council and is meant to show crops to the Toronto audience of the Royal Winter Fair.

Bottom: The champion bull for the National Hereford Show (first on left) was HF 503W Kingdom 236Y shown by Jay Holmes and Shelia Kirk Mission Ridge Herefords of Raymore, Ont. Reserve (middle) went to MHPH 521X Action 106A of Medonte Highlands Polled Herefords & Taboo Polled Herefords of Mississauga, Ont. PHOTOS: BRUCE SARGENT

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Always follow grain marketing and all other stewardship practices and pesticide label directions. Details of these requirements can be found in the Trait Stewardship Responsibilities Notice to Farmers printed in this publication.

22

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Another perspective on GE and conventional crop coexistence STRAIGHT FROM THE HIP  An Australian Nuffield Scholar believes it’s

important for different practices to be able to continue in the same region

PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

BY BRENDA SCHOEPP

J

emma Sadler is an exceptional grain farmer. She operates in partnership with her brother, growing wheat and canola in the Wongan Hills of West Australia.

She is bright, detailed, progressive and successful.

Jemma is also at the heart of one of agriculture’s greatest

debates — the coexistence of conventional, organic and genetically engineered (GE) crops. She started looking at the challenge through the lens of weed control.

With herbicide resistance at nearepidemic levels, what were the other solutions and could genetically selected herbicide-tolerant crops lead to solutions? More importantly, could these growers successfully advance in areas

do your costs measure up?

where there was conventional and organic production?

The use of GE crops is not new.

Today more than 17 million farmers in 36 countries use some type of GE crop. So the existence of and the merit of the crop is not Jemma’s focus. She does, however, challenge all producers to think about the coexistence of both conventional and GE crops in the same region. This is where emotion tends to cloud the discussion and folks start to debate the practice — whereas Jemma quietly resolves to clear a pathway for coexistence.

The solution for some conventional farmers is in the introduction of GE crops and the debate remains in that decisionmaking process.

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Hybrid $60/acre

Jemma farms both conventional and GE crops over 4,500 hectares, so she has great experience in production. Her main weeds are wild radish and annual ryegrass.

In Australia there is 15 per cent susceptibility to treatment on the wild radish and six per cent on the annual ryegrass. The use of herbicide then becomes almost redundant. The solution for some

conventional farmers is in the introduction of GE crops and the debate remains in that decisionmaking process.

To complicate the discussion, when Jemma and I were in London and visiting with WTO leaders, it became apparent that the global definition of a GE plant had not yet been established. How then do we define good from bad, right from wrong and have a solution in communities where both camps have a difference of opinion in the meanings? Jemma offers these solutions after two years of her Nuffield study.

Jemma acknowledges that herbicide-tolerant crops play a role in managing weeds and that for all the management systems to continue to prosper, there must be some avenue of coexistence.

She says all systems will need to be healthy and in place to ensure that the industry can continue to meet rising demand.

As I walked along with Jemma in her fields, I felt that her relationship with the land was intense as was her relationship with her community. This was evident in the shared-access roads and careful planning of traffic and shelterbelts. She did, however, confess to contacting a fellow farmer late in the season just before planting to inform him of her conventional and GE planting intentions.

The late call was distressing to the farmer, who felt he had not enough time to evaluate the process. It was — she admits — an error on her part to not have phoned earlier in the year.

It is these types of incidents that Jemma says can be avoided and she goes as far as to recommend that

thresholds should be supported to protect those farmers who wish to carry on with conventional and organic farming. She also recommends that industry support and technology equally distribute the information for the betterment of all cropping practices. She found examples worldwide of sensitive site mapping and regional plans that allowed for seed purity and the coexistence of crops.

Both non-chemical weed management and integrated weed management from machine to microwave, high-pressure spray to the development of glyphosate reversal are all options and will likely have a high rate of acceptance based on test results, whereas the widespread acceptance of GE crops such as glyphosate wheat will meet more challenge.

Finally, Jemma throws open the door and recommends that growers be solely responsible for their own choices and their own costs. To do so in harmony takes a little time and courage but it is very important for the survivability of all production systems. You can view Jemma’s report at http:// www.nuffieldinternational.org/ rep_pdf/1373427982SadlerJem mafinalreport.pdf and decide for yourself if and how the organic, conventional and GE crops can coexist amicably.

Brenda Schoepp is a Nuffield Scholar who travels extensively exploring agriculture and meeting the people who feed, clothe and educate our world. A motivating speaker and mentor she works with young entrepreneurs across Canada and is the founder of Women in Search of Excellence. www.brendaschoepp.com

23

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

The beer facts — beer drinking is good for Canadian economy Study says ‘almost every industry in Canada is supported in some way by the beer economy — from grain production to retailing and serving’

By Lorraine Stevenson staff

I

f you’re an average beer drinker in Alberta, a new report pegs your consumption at about 260 bottles a year.

That’s the fourth-highest per capita consumption of beer in Canada and slightly higher than the national average 235 bottles, according to a new report from the Conference Board of Canada.

From Farm to Glass: The Value of Beer in Canada looks at the entire supply chain supporting beer production, pointing out its benefits include $5.8 billion in tax revenues for all levels of government nationally, including $384 million in Alberta.

More popular than wine or spirits among Canadians, consumption of beer accounts for 8.1 per cent of all household spending on food and beverages.

What the report dubs “the beer economy,” which includes brewing industry as well as retail sales, transportation and wholesale distribution, plus the agricultural products needed to make beer also supports 163,200 jobs, or one in every 100 across the country.

“Beer has been a part of Canadian life for hundreds of years,” Pedro Antunes, director, National and Provincial Forecast says in a CFOC news release. “The beer economy is a significant employer. No matter where people buy beer, they support jobs across the country.”

Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta aren’t large beer brewers compared to other parts of Canada but agricultural production of the malting barley, plus distribution and warehousing are the economic generations here. But the main money is generated by drinking the beer itself, the report says.

“The bulk of the beer economy in the Prairies is focused on the consumption aspects of beer demand,” the report said. “Beer is a popular beverage choice in this region, and much economic activity is generated in the food services, retail, and recreation and amusement industries.”

almost every industry in Canada is supported in some way by the beer economy — from grain production for ingredients, to the forestry and manufacturing that goes into producing the packaging.

“It’s also far reaching in the geographical sense,” the report concludes, adding that there are significant spinoff benefits to the economy as a a result of the combined industries in the beer economy. For every $1 spent on beer, $1.12 in GDP is created in the Canadian economy, it said.

The study was commissioned by Beer Canada. It is publicly available at www.conferenceboard. ca/e-library/default.aspx. lorraine@fbcpublishing.com

The beer economy in Canada supports one out of every 100 jobs in Canada, a Conference Board of Canada report says. PHOTo: thinkstock

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The report says beer consumption across the country supports 20,394 jobs in the three Prairie provinces, including 12,968 full-time jobs in Alberta. Alberta has a more selfsufficient beer economy than elsewhere on the Prairies, due to its significant beer-brewing capacity, the report said.

Beer consumption accounted for $13.8 billion in annual economic activity in Canada on average in 2009-11 — the three most recent years for which detailed beer consumption data are available.

In 2012, residents in Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec and the Prairie provinces consumed more beer than the Canadian average; British Columbians consumed the lowest amount.

Yukon has the highest per capita consumption, at 385 bottleequivalents per person in 2012.

The business of beer has national reach and impact, the report concludes, noting that

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24

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

U.S. corn exports seen second smallest in 20 years, despite record crop Last year’s drought taught importers to look elsewhere and taught the rest of the world to plant corn

By Karl Plume reuters

T

he United States, which once supplied three-quarters of all corn traded globally, has seen its market share erode with the emergence of rival suppliers in South America and eastern Europe and a record-large U.S. crop this season will do little to revive its corn export dominance.

Several years of historically high prices have bolstered corn production in breadbaskets such as Brazil, Argentina and Ukraine, all of which are forecast to export record or near-record volumes this season.

Meanwhile, last year’s historic drought in the United States, the world’s top corn producer, prompted traditional U.S. corn importers to look to other suppli-

FDA’s trans fat ban good news for canola NYSE Liffe is planning to launch a new rapeseed oil and meal contract in 2014

ers and those trade relationships have blossomed.

“We destroyed demand last year due to the high prices and the drought and traditional importers had to look elsewhere,” said Art Liming, futures specialist with Citigroup.

“We’ll get some of that demand back but won’t get it all back because we’ve taught the rest of the world to plant corn and we’ve taught other importers to buy from other origins.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Nov. 8 increased its forecast for U.S. corn exports in the 2013-14 season (Sept./Aug.) by 14 per cent to more than 35.5 million tonnes, nearly double the prior season’s 37-year low export volume.

But that forecast was still the second smallest in two decades and just a 32 per cent share of world trade, according to USDA data.

Until 2011, the United States rarely held less than a 50 per cent share of world corn trade while Argentina and Brazil combined never held more than 30 per cent of the market and Ukraine never held more than seven per cent.

USDA kept its Argentine corn export view at 18 million tonnes, the second highest ever, and held Ukrainian exports at a record 18 million tonnes. It increased its Brazilian export forecast to 20 million tonnes, up two million from the previous estimate and the country’s third-largest corn exports ever.

Traditional U.S. corn customers such as South Korea and Japan have bought large amounts of the grain from other suppliers in recent years.

China, which was a net corn exporter until 2009 and is projected to become the world’s top importer within a decade, has expanded its list of large-volume suppliers from

A harvester machine clears a field of corn in late autumn in Thurmont, Maryland October 27, 2013. PHOTo: REUTERS/Gary Cameron just the United States to Argentina and Brazil.

“It’s very prudent on China’s part.

They realize they will be continuing to import corn if their domestic production doesn’t increase substantially and they don’t want

to rely only on the U.S. for origination,” said Shawn McCambridge, analyst with Jefferies Bache.

“If the U.S. has another drought, they don’t want to have to work out any phytosanitary issues at the last minute.”

SOME SEED REPS STAND BY THEIR PRODUCTS. WE PREFER TO GET WAIST-DEEP IN THEM.

By Brandon Logan

commodity news service canada

T

he U.S. Food and Drug A d m i n i s t r a t i o n ( F DA ) announcement Nov. 7 that it plans to phase out the use of trans fat in processed foods could cause demand for soyoil to drop in coming years, opening the door for other edible oil markets.

“The announcement was really a surprise,” Dave Lehman, managing director of commodity research and product development for the CME Group in Chicago, Illinois, said at the Cereals North America global grain conference in Winnipeg. “I saw that bean oil (on the Chicago Board of Trade) was down 40 points (Nov. 4).”

The sell-off of CBOT soyoil continued through Nov. 8, as prices were down over 40 points at mid-morning.

If the plan does go into effect, other oil markets like canola, palm and rapeseed could see increased demand with them possibly serving as replacements for soyoil.

Lehman said the announcement should have “rapeseed and canola folks feeling pretty good.”

The timing was good for Nicholas Kennedy of NYSE Liffe, who made a big announcement regarding a new contract.

“We’re launching as soon as next year a rapeseed oil and meal contract,” he said. “That will be sometime in 2014.”

The FDA did not announce a timeline for their plan to phase out trans fats from processed foods.

If you’re looking for your local Pioneer Hi-Bred sales representative, try the nearest farm.

You see, we’re always out walking the fields, talking to our neighbours and checking the crops.

In fact, we make it our mission to know everything there is to know about our local growing

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T:17.4”

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25

Albertafarmexpress.ca • november 25, 2013

Popcorn makers could face long, expensive road to lose trans fats One company has already made the switch, but it took four years of research and development

By Curtis Skinner new york / reuters

M

A Diamond Food’s Pop Secret microwave popcorn box is seen illustrated in New York, November 8, 2013. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration November 7, 2013 proposed banning artificial trans fats in processed food ranging from cookies to frozen pizza, citing the risk of heart disease. PHOTo: REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

icrowave popcorn makers could face a long and difficult task ridding their snacks of trans fats, if a U.S. Food and Drug Administration proposal to ban the additives goes into effect.

Just ask Orville Redenbacher.

Redenbacher’s, a division of ConAgra Foods Inc., spent six years changing its leading line of popcorn, company scientists said Nov. 8, a day after the FDA made its proposal, which the government said would save 7,000 lives a year.

The Popcorn Board, an industry trade group, said Americans munch 16 billion quarts of popped popcorn a year, and more than twothirds of that is eaten in the home. $985.7 million worth of unpopped kernels were sold in 2010, down 2.2 per cent from five years ear-

lier. Popcorn also is the source of a substantial amount of the trans fats consumed by Americans.

Diamond Foods Inc. — owner of Pop Secret — and American Pop Corn Company — owner of Jolly Time — still use the suspect fat in some products. Diamond Foods fell 4.6 per cent from its open on the news, but pared losses before the following day’s close. American Pop Corn Company is not publicly traded.

Redenbacher’s ditched the fats in all of its products starting in 2006, because of the health concerns.

Initial research and development of switching to a trans fatfree oil was four years. It took two years more to change the entire product line.

“We’ve mastered it, and I’m not going to tell you how we did it,” laughed Pamela Newell, a senior director of product development at ConAgra. It took “a lot of money,”

she added, since many replacement oil blends limited or reduced the flavour of the popcorn.

Partially hydrogenated oils, the primary source of the fats in foods, have long been prized by microwavable popcorn companies for their high melting point. The fat keeps oil solid until the package is heated, so unpopped bags don’t ooze.

It also provides a taste and texture in the mouth which isn’t easy to replicate, popcorn makers say. But when consumed, trans fats increase bad cholesterol, a leading cause of coronary artery disease.

Since 2005, trans fat usage has fallen precipitously — the Grocery Manufacturers Association said manufacturers have voluntarily lowered the amounts of trans fats in their food products by more than 73 per cent. But further reduction could prevent 20,000 heart attacks as well as the 7,000 deaths from heart disease a year, the FDA said.

Sales from ConAgra’s consumer food segments rose eight per cent in fiscal 2013, due in part to Redenbacher’s, according to the company’s most recent annual report.

Diamond Foods’ Pop Secret still produces a half-dozen products — including the Movie Theatre Butter and Homestyle varieties — that carry between 4.5 and five grams of the harmful fat per serving.

The brand, which was purchased from General Mills in 2008, has been central to the company’s 3.3 per cent growth in its core snack sales segment, said Diamond CEO Brian Driscoll during the most recent quarterly conference call.

The ban would follow more limited restrictions across the country.

New York City banned the use of trans fats in restaurants, including their use for deep frying foods, and many restaurants and fastfood chains, including McDonald’s Corp., have eliminated their use.

U.S. farmland prices cool T:10”

reuters/Prices of prime farmland in the central and southern U.S. Midwest fell six per cent in the third quarter as the red-hot market cooled off amid plunging grain prices and this year’s expected record harvest, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis said Nov. 15. “Values for quality farmland across the district saw a decrease of six per cent from the second-quarter average. Values averaged $5,332 per acre in the third quarter of 2013, down from $5,672 per acre in the previous quarter.

Despite this decline, quality farmland values remain 9.1 per cent higher than at the same point last year,” the bank said in its quarterly survey of 47 district banks. The district comprises all or parts of the following seven Midwestern and Mid-South states: Arkansas, southern Illinois and Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Tennessee. The region is a top producer of corn, soybeans, hogs, winter wheat and other cash crops.

“Bankers expect further erosion in district qualityfarmland values over the next three months,” the Fed said.

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26

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

New wheat cluster receives $25-million investment The new wheat cluster will focus on developing wheat varieties in all market classes that have higher yield, quality, and disease resistance

By Jennifer Blair af staff / red deer

A

griculture Minister Gerry Ritz has announced $25 million in funding to a national wheat research “cluster.”

“Innovation is critical to moving Canada’s wheat industry forward,” Ritz said when making the announcement at Agri-Trade here earlier this month. “Our government continues to partner with industry and academia to do what it takes to get our wheat yields back on the growth curve.”

Led by the Western Grains Research Foundation (WGRF) and supported by the Canadian Field Crops Research Alliance (CFCRA) and the Alberta Wheat Commission (AWC), the national wheat improvement cluster will bring together scientific expertise from across Canada, including the research centres in Lacombe and Lethbridge, to develop wheat varieties in all classes that have higher yield, quality, and disease resistance. “Every dollar invested by wheat producers in varietal research puts over $20 back in your pocket,” said Minister Ritz.

“It’s a good investment.”

The $12.5 million in federal

funding will combine with the industry contribution of $9.6 million from WGRF, $1.3 million from the AWC, and $1.7 million from the CFCRA to account for a total investment of more than $25 million in the wheat cluster over the next five years.

That investment is needed if wheat producers hope to remain competitive on the global stage, said Keith Degenhardt, vice-chair of the WGRF. “In order to have wheat varieties keep coming, we need to keep that pipeline going, and that requires a long-term commitment to do it. Ongoing investment in research is needed for producers to continue to have access to the best performing wheat varieties.”

As administrator of the funding, the WGRF hopes to continue its solid track record of investing in wheat research that will provide the best return for producers.

“Producer investments in wheat variety development have and will continue to provide a solid return for western Canadian wheat growers,” Degenhardt said.

Since 1995, WGRF has invested about $5 million annually and $6 million from its endowment fund into wheat-breeding research.

And the results speak for them-

selves, said Degenhardt. “WGRF has assisted in the development and release of more than 120 higher-yielding wheat varieties with improved disease and pest resistance over the past 18 years.”

As the organization representing Alberta’s wheat growers, the AWC chose the wheat cluster as one of its first major investments.

“Alberta producers recognize the importance of having strong varieties and excellent agronomics,” said Terry Young, AWC’s chair of the research and development committee. “Producers are proud of the breeding program that Canada has built and want to help it prosper,” Young said. A “three-p partnership” — public, private, and producer — is needed for breeding efforts and ongoing research to continue to excel, according to Young. “In order to have a vibrant, sustainable, and competitive wheat industry, breeding efforts, especially those at Ag Canada, must continue to receive funding necessary to produce consistently reliable varieties in response to the changing environment.”

Crosby Devitt, chair of the CFCRA, believes that this national co-ordinated research effort will also provide greater mar-

Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz announced a $25-million investment in wheat research at Agri-Trade. PHOTo: Jennifer Blair ket opportunities for Canadian growers. “The new wheat lines developed through this research program will be adapted for the diverse growing regions across Canada and specialized for the key market opportunities that benefit the entire Canadian wheat sec-

tor,” said Devitt. “We are looking forward to the next five years of research and the results that will strengthen Canada’s position as a leader in wheat production globally.” jennifer.blair@fbcpublishing.com

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GREAT GORP PROJECT Triathlete creates home-grown energy bar » PAGE 44

The pros and cons of applying in dry soil » PAGE 17

OCTOBER 11, 2012

Communications breakdown added to emergency Firefighting made more dangerous without communications

By Lorraine Stevenson CO-OPERATOR STAFF

V

olunteer firefighters racing to reach fire-threatened Vita last week passed hundreds of vehicles headed the other direction and wondered what they were headed into, said veteran firefighter Alain Nadeau.

“I’ve been doing this for 33 years and this was the scariest I’ve seen,” said the weary La Broquerie fire chief on Friday after an exhausting week.

The air was so smoke filled around the southeastern village “we could barely breathe,” he said.

SERVING MANITOBA FARMERS SINCE 1925 | VOL. 70, NO. 41

GOT SEED?

By Daniel Winters CO-OPERATOR STAFF / MELITA

R

ising corn acres and severe drought in the Midwestern United States may crimp supplies of popular corn seed varieties for the com-

ing year.

“It’s really short,” said Ron Rabe, a Dekalb agronomist, who gave a brief talk on corn production in Manitoba at a recent WADO field tour.

Derek Erb, who farms near Oak Bluff and sells Pioneer Hi-Bred corn

|

$1.75

MANITOBACOOPERATOR.CA

Corn seed might be tight next spring Rising demand and dismal growing conditions in the drought-stricken United States may limit supplies seed, said farmers looking to secure seed for next spring should act quickly to secure their supplies, even if it means placing orders earlier than usual.

Pioneer Hi-Bred’s top varieties, which include D95 and D97, account for roughly half the acres seeded in the province. Erb said that with the harvest and quality testing still underway in some areas, it’s difficult to estimate how much corn seed will be available for next year.

One thing’s for sure, waiting until Ag Days in January to secure supplies will

be too late. “I would pretty much bank on that,” said Erb. Dry conditions throughout the province have seen the corn harvest arriving about a month earlier than usual, and seed orders have started coming in sooner than usual too.

Even with the possibility of a shortage of corn seed, Erb doesn’t expect the price of Pioneer’s supplies to rise much more than it has in recent years.

Rob Park, of RJP Seeds in Carman, who deals in Hyland seed varieties, See CORN SEED on page 6 »

27

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

New grains council head faces personal and professional challenges Richard Phillips has taken over as president of the Canada Grains Council at a difficult time in his own life and one of rapid change in the grain sector

By Alex Binkley

af contributor / ottawa

R

ichard Phillips was expecting plenty of challenges when he took over as president of the Canada Grains Council.

But July 31, his last day as executive director of Grain Growers of Canada, brought him a challenge he hadn’t expected. His doctor told him he had an advanced case of bladder cancer. What was to have been a quiet summer for him and his wife turned into the agony of surgery and treatments.

By mid-November, he was able to start working part time,

CropLife Canada names Ted Menzies president

but admits his energy fades and the days following a treatment are low points.

However, he doesn’t spend much time in an interview feeling sorry for himself and in conversation is soon running through the issues facing the council and grain industry.

His predecessor, Dennis Stephens, focused on major issues such as the presence of genetically modified traits in grain shipments and removing barriers to the international shipments of grain.

For Phillips, the pivotal issue will be the shape of the country’s grain industry now that the Canadian Wheat Board — the face of the Canadian grain industry in many countries —

no longer has monopoly over wheat and barley exports.

“We have to take a good look at where we are going,” said Phillips. “There is a real need for us to be co-ordinated so we don’t confuse the customers. They want to buy Canadian grain and not have to be pitched for grain from particular provinces. We have to focus on what’s best for the customer.”

Two new organizations — Cereals Canada and the Barley Council of Canada — have been created this year, and that has implications for the Canada Grains Council, he said.

“We have to sort out the role of the council,” said Phillips.

“Is it to be a council of industry

councils or does it have another purpose?”

For example, his organization could assist new councils in dealing with research issues and other services to farmers, he said. It also needs to consider how smaller, non-grower members — such as the railways, grain-handling terminals, ports and farm supply companies — might best fit into the scheme of things.

Other issues high on his agenda are the rail transportation system, which has been strained by this year’s bumper crop in Western Canada, and the revamping of the Canadian Grain Commission, which has raised concerns with its plan to increase fees.

Richard Phillips

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ed Menzies, longtime Alberta farmer and former member of Parliament, has been named the new president and CEO of CropLife Canada.

Menzies will join the organization January 1, 2014 and will work from its head office in Ottawa.

“Ted earned the respect of colleagues from across the political spectrum during his time in federal politics. His ability to collaborate with others in the pursuit of meaningful solutions and his extensive agricultural background are attributes that will serve Ted and our industry well,” said Kamel Beliazi, chair of the CropLife Canada board of directors.

Prior to entering federal politics in 2004, Menzies was involved in several farm organizations, including the Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance, Grain Growers of Canada and Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association.

Menzies owned and operated a 5,000-acre farm from 1974-2003 where he produced grain, oilseeds, pulses and spices.

Menzies replaces Lorne Hepworth, who is retiring after 18 years at the helm of the organization.

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28

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

New report says improved food literacy key to a healthier life Conference Board of Canada says too many people can’t understand nutrition labels, make a meal in their kitchen, or stick to a food budget to reduce waste

By Lorraine Stevenson staff

I

mproved food literacy would improve the health of Canadian adults and children, says a new report from the Conference Board of Canada.

The number of books, television programs and websites dedicated to food — not to mention diets — continue to multiply, but our understanding of food isn’t necessarily getting better, says the 46-page report.

“It is unclear whether households’ attitudes, skills and knowledge about food — their food literacy — have developed along with that interest. In reality, Canadians’ food literacy may not be as high as it could and should be.”

Being able to interpret nutrition labelling on foods is one area of concern. Canadians, especially those lacking numeracy skills, struggle with them despite efforts to raise awareness about Nutrition Facts tables, says the report, entitled What’s to Eat: Improving Food Literacy in Canada.

The low percentage of children and adolescents regularly participating in family meal preparation is another concern and may be leading to more “deskilled” generations to come.

Canadians also waste a lot of food, and the report suggests the root of the problem may be that relatively few households have and follow a food budget.

“Many households could improve their planning and purchasing habits,” it says.

Food safety is another area of concern. While individuals generally know how to store, handle and prepare food, the report says, “they do not always put that knowledge to use” and “tend to mistakenly believe that their risk of exposure to food-related hazards in the home is minimal.”

As well, immigrants and some Aboriginal peoples face additional barriers to food literacy, it says.

Lack of food skills in youth also persists into adulthood, increasing the risk of ill health for the next generation, it says.

“Many of the most common chronic diseases, including cardiovascular diseases (mainly heart disease and stroke), cancer, chronic respiratory diseases, diabetes, and others (such as oral diseases, and bone and joint disorders) — are linked to unhealthy diets and subsequent overweight and obesity rates,” the report notes.

The issue also spills into other areas.

“For example, whether new production and processing technologies that promise improvements to safety, yields, and/or environmental performance will be permitted for use, or are actually put into use, depends to some extent on whether households understand and have confidence in those technologies.”

There’s not a lot of data on Canadians’ food literacy, but numerous studies elsewhere have found health levels improve when people have a better understanding of nutrition and food preparation. A Health Canada review of international cooking skills lit-

erature has also concluded “that there is an association between food literacy and dietary quality, frequency of family meals and involvement in food preparation activities among adolescents and young adults.”

The report makes a series of recommendations, including making nutritional information more effective and accessible for household use; tailoring food literacy programs to high-risk populations and community needs fostering hands-on parental involvement in food literacy programming; creating guiding principles for advertising to children; and incorporating food literacy into school curricula.

The report stresses that nutrition education for children is

especially important as a positive influence on children’s foodrelated knowledge and skills, eating and physical activity behaviour, and health status.

Improving food literacy has also been a key theme in other policy proposals attempting to map out a long-term national food strategy.

The Canadian Federation of Agriculture says government should ensure every Canadian child by age 16 should know how to plan and prepare at least six nutritious meals. A 2009 report from the Canadian Agri-Food Policy calls for a “whole of society” approach that puts an informed consumer at the centre of a healthier food system. lorraine@fbcpublishing.com

Report cites concerns related to the “normalization” of processed and packaged foods” and concerns that the next generation’s food choices will be limited because they lack confidence to prepare food. PHOTo: thinkstock

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29

Albertafarmexpress.ca • november 25, 2013

Beekeepers and canola growers can be partners Growers need to adopt best management practices to keep bees healthy

By Alexis Kienlen af staff /edmonton

D Greg Sekulic, agronomy specialist with the Canola Council of Canada says bees and canola are good partners. PHOTo: Alexis Kienlen

espite recent concerns about bees being harmed by neonicotinoid seed treatments, bees and canola can get along, says a Canola Council of Canada agronomist.

Canola growers can adopt certain practices to ensure the health of honeybees, Greg Sekulic told the Alberta Beekeepers Commission annual general meeting.

“By and large, the industries get along together quite well,” he said. “Bees can do great stuff for us in terms of yield and in

terms of increasing our flowering window.”

Sekulic said honeybees are beneficial to canola, especially hybrid varieties which are 95 per cent reliant on pollination. In turn, about 70 to 85 per cent of the honey produced in Canada uses canola as a feedstock.

“Bees do well in canola. The crop has a nutritious pollen and large amounts of nectar,” Sekulic said.

However, he said growers need to keep in mind that anything they do in the field could have an effect on bees, good or bad. Growers need to know where hives are, and inform neighbouring beekeepers of any pesticide spraying.

In some cases, beekeepers may need to cover or move their hives during spraying.

Sekulic said data on acute kills reported by the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) says that acute bee losses due to insecticide are low. Most are avoidable, and seem to occur when older chemicals are used.

However, actual losses are estimated to be about three to four times higher, because beekeepers don’t report their kills to the PMRA. Sekulic said that beekeepers should report their losses in order to get a better idea of actual damage.

Recommended practices

There are several practices that can be adopted to minimize damage on bees and other beneficial insects. Sekulic recommends growers refrain from blanket herbicide applications, and prophylactic (preventive) treatments.

Flowering canola should never be sprayed unless it is completely necessary. Growers should use economic thresholds to ensure that they are only spraying when it makes economic sense.

“Growers need to keep in mind that anything they do in the field could have an effect on bees, good or bad.”

Greg Sekulic

T:10”

“We have a good understanding of the ecology of the bulk of our pests and the threshold data is good, so stick to those numbers,” he said. “Bear in mind that the thresholds just cover the cost of application. It’s not a moneymaking endeavour.”

Growers should also use the least-toxic insecticides, keeping in mind that many of the bee-friendly products may be a little more expensive. They should also rotate their insecticides. Drift-control nozzles are recommended, and growers should leave a wide buffer zone of about 50 metres away from the hives. The best time to apply insecticide is after 8 p.m. or before 9 a.m., when bees are not actively foraging.

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30

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Despite rhetoric, China positions for rising corn imports It has recently approved Argentina and Ukraine as new suppliers

BY DOMINIQUE PATTON AND NIU SHUPING BEIJING / REUTERS

C

hina says it will remain self-sufficient in corn.

Thing is, most analysts think that it will struggle to meet that goal, and the government’s actions seem to show that it agrees.

Despite the rhetoric, the government has been positioning itself for an increasing corn shortfall, approving Argentina and Ukraine as new suppliers and opening the door to substitutes. Given China’s growing demand for meat, and thus feed for animals, it could just be bowing to the inevitable.

If imports of corn substitutes are added, China is already pushing up against its target of growing 95 per cent of the corn it uses.

With that target China would import 10 million tonnes of corn, three million tonnes more than expected this year. But analysts expect it to blow well past that to become the world’s biggest importer of the grain before the end of the decade.

The shift will support higher output in countries like the United States, Argentina and

Ukraine, boosting international prices that hit the lowest in more than three years on Tuesday.

“Growth of demand is largely driven by the livestock sector, increasing corn imports is inevitable,” said Jiang Changyun, research director at the Industrial Development Research Institute, a think-tank under the powerful planning body, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).

Jiang said a 90 per cent target would be acceptable. This would see China import 20 million tonnes, topping the 14.9 million current No. 1 Japan bought in 2012.

Despite the pressure on supply, policy-makers are unwilling to modify or abandon the 95 per cent target. Food security remains a highly political issue in the world’s most populous country, where many still remember devastating famine in the late 1950s and early 1960s and the ruling Communist Party is keen to maintain stability amidst an ever-widening wealth gap.

China’s Agriculture Minister Han Changfu last month reaffirmed Beijing’s determination to stick to its long-established target.

Yet demand for corn is growing at a pace that cannot be met by

local production, recent import data shows.

China is estimated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to import seven million tonnes of corn in the 2013-14 season, up from just three million tonnes in the prior year. It is also bringing in record volumes of substitutes such as sorghum and distillers dried grains (DDGS).

Some four million tonnes of DDGS could be imported this year to plug demand from feed mills, says the China National Grains and Oils Information Center, surging past record imports of three million tonnes in 2010.

Sorghum orders for 2013-14 are expected to reach 1.5 million tonnes, estimates Fan Zhenyu, an executive at the country’s top corn trader, COFCO. This is about 15 per cent of the harvest in top grower the United States.

“If we include substitute products, the absolute volume of our feed raw material imports is 10 million tonnes. Given this trend, the self-sufficiency ratio could be 93 per cent by 2018 and 90 per cent by 2020,” Fan told a corn conference last month.

DDGS and sorghum are free of the fixed volume of quotas that limit corn imports. Also, DDGS is not subject to the 13 per cent

A farmer dries newly harvested corncobs near her field in Zhuliang village of Qingzhou, Shandong province September 27, 2013. China, the world’s second-largest corn consumer, is likely to rely more on imports.

PHOTO: REUTERS/CHINA DAILY

value-added tax levied on other farm products and the government dropped an anti-dumping investigation into U.S. DDGS imports last June after lobbying by the feed industry.

Meanwhile the first of this year’s large sorghum orders has arrived in China, unhindered by regulatory issues that often plague new imports.

Yet supply of corn alternatives will be limited. The U.S. sorghum harvest is only 10 million tonnes in a bumper year. DDGS is highly dependent on ethanol production, which looks set to drop if the U.S. reduces the amount of the biofuel required in gasoline.

To widen its options, Beijing has approved two new corn suppliers this year. Argentina’s exports to China may reach one million tonnes next year

while Ukraine recently shipped 120,000 tonnes of the grain to China in exchange for loans.

Brazilian agriculture officials said in September they expect China to approve corn imports sometime this year.

But the United States is likely to remain China’s dominant corn supplier.

Driving corn demand is China’s meat consumption, set to increase 20 per cent over the next 10 years, according to an OECD-FAO Agricultural Outlook published in June.

Less heralded but accounting for about a third of total corn use is an expanding processing sector, which makes byproducts like starch, glucose and alcohol and according to the State Council’s Research Office exports much of its value-added output.

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31

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

U.S. aligns beef rules with OIE’s BSE standards U.S. hopes opening its market will convince others to do the same reuters

T

he U.S. government on Nov. 1 issued new import rules for cattle and beef that will comply with international standards for the prevention of BSE, saying the step could ultimately boost U.S. beef exports.

The European Union said the U.S. move would bring a welcome reopening of a market closed to its beef since January 1998.

Lawmakers and industry groups also welcomed the news, saying it would help the U.S. regain access to markets that have been closed for decades.

World trade in beef was jolted in the 1980s by the discovery of BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), a fatal brain-wasting disease in cattle. Many nations restricted imports and some do still, out of fear of a human version of the illness.

“Making these changes will further demonstrate to our trading partners our commitment to international standards and sound science, and we are hopeful it will help open new markets and remove remaining restrictions on U.S. products,” said chief veterinarian John Clifford of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

As an example of the new revisions, USDA said boneless beef could be imported because research has shown the meat poses a negligible risk of BSE. Until now, imports were restricted from most nations that had reported a case of the disease.

USDA said the new revisions, which will be published in coming days and take effect 90 days afterward, would not weaken U.S. safeguards.

“This effort is crucial to breaking down other countries’ unfounded trade barriers, and reopening trade markets that are closed to U.S. beef,” said Debbie Stabenow, chairwoman of the U.S. Senate agriculture committee.

Stabenow said Mexico employed a non-scientific limit on U.S. cattle exports by refusing to allow entry of animals over 30 months of age. She said U.S. producers lose an estimated US$100 million a year because of the limit.

The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (U.S.) said the new rules were “great news for the U.S. cattle industry and integral to our efforts to further expand international trade.”

OIE guidelines

In a fact sheet, USDA said the changes “could convince other

countries to remove any remaining restrictions on U.S. cattle and cattle products.” The rules bring USDA in line with the guidelines of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE).

On May 29, the OIE gave the United States its safest classification for BSE, “negligible” risk.

U.S. officials have struggled for more than a decade to open markets that were restricted following discovery of the first U.S. case of the disease.

The U.S. is among the world’s largest importer and exporter of beef. Roughly 10 per cent of U.S. beef is exported, while imports make up nearly 10 per cent of the U.S. supply. Imports tend to be ground beef and lower-cost cuts

of beef while the exports are highvalue cuts.

Still, a small ranchers’ group, R-CALF USA, said it doubted the safety of beef from Europe and called for retention of a country-oforigin meat-labelling law currently under attack in Congress.

The U.S. uses three interlocking safeguards against BSE. Feed for cattle and other ruminants can’t contain rendered parts of ruminants. USDA runs a surveillance and testing program for mad cow.

And meat packers are required to remove from carcasses brains, spinal cords, nervous tissue and other materials that could be infected.

BSE, with an incubation period of years, is primarily a disease of older cattle.

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32

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Brazil declares caterpillar emergency

Ukraine PM sees record harvest

Infestations of the Helicoverpa caterpillar in Brazil’s Grain Belt prompted the Agriculture Ministry to declare a state of emergency in the leading soy state of Mato Grosso last week, highlighting the potential risk to large parts of the crop. The ministry also declared an emergency in the state of Bahia, a smaller but important producer state where difficulty controlling pests caused losses last year. State governments will draw up guidelines for dealing with the pest that is believed to be a serious threat to crops. — Reuters

Ukraine’s grain harvest will amount to more than 61 million tonnes, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said Nov. 15, up from 46.2 million tonnes in 2012. “It is clear that we will finish this year with a record harvest which will exceed 61 million tonnes,” Azarov wrote on his Facebook page. The Agriculture Ministry has said the harvest is likely to total up to 60 million tonnes this year. The former Soviet republic harvested 58.2 million tonnes of grain from 95 per cent of sown area as of Nov. 13, according to the ministry’s data. — Reuters

Warm and dry or cold and snowy winter?

Comparing the various predictions for what’s in store for Alberta for the next few months

by daniel bezte

I

n the last issue I promised we would take a look at the long-range winter forecasts, but before we do that I have to take a moment to discuss Super Typhoon Haiyan, which hit the Philippines a couple of weeks ago.

First, just for clarification, a typhoon is the same thing as a hurricane. Typhoon is the name given to these storms when they form over the western Pacific Ocean.

These tropical storm systems become typhoons or hurricanes when the sustained winds reach a speed of 74 miles per hour or 119 km/h.

A typhoon becomes a super typhoon when sustained wind speeds hit 150 m.p.h. or 241 km/h. In the Atlantic, this would be a Category 5 hurricane.

Initially, Super Typhoon Haiyan was reported as possibly being the strongest typhoon or hurricane to hit land ever, with a satelliteestimated sustained wind speed of 195 m.p.h., which is five m.p.h. greater than that of Hurricane Camille, which hit the southern U.S. in 1969.

Using satellite imagery to estimate the wind speed of these storms is not an exact science and reports are coming in that wind speeds were possibly only in the 160 m.p.h. range. Even if 160 m.p.h. were the strongest winds, when it hit land that would be the equivalent of an F3 tornado, only much bigger in size and lasting a whole lot longer.

We’ll probably never know what the true wind speeds were for this typhoon and whether or not it was a record storm is irrelevant — what is relevant is the fact that a very destructive storm hit the Philippines and has caused extensive damage, with early estimates reporting insured damages of as much as $2 billion, total economic damages approaching $14 billion, and estimates that as many as 6,000 may have lost their lives to this devastating storm.

To put what has happened

in the Philippines into some kind of perspective, here is a partial quote from storm chaser Josh Morgerman of iCyclone.com, who was in the city of Tacloban, directly hit by the storm.

“First off, Tacloban City is devastated. The city is a horrid landscape of smashed buildings and completely defoliated trees, with widespread looting and unclaimed bodies decaying in the open air. The typhoon moved fast and didn’t last long — only a few hours — but it struck the city with absolutely terrifying ferocity… meteorologically, Super Typhoon Haiyan was fascinating; from a human interest standpoint, it was utterly ghastly. It’s been difficult to process.”

Initially, Super Typhoon Haiyan was reported as possibly being the strongest typhoon or hurricane to hit land ever, with a satellite-estimated sustained wind speed of 195 m.p.h., which is five m.p.h. greater than that of Hurricane Camille, which hit the southern U.S. in 1969.

The coming winter

On that rather sad note, let’s lighten things up a bit and take a look at what the longrange forecasts are calling for in our part of the world this winter.

While there are a number of different people and organizations that come out with long-range winter forecasts, I think this year we’ll focus only on the forecasts that I use to create our monthly weather outlooks — Environment Canada, Old Farmer’s

This issue’s map shows the total snow cover across the Prairies as of Nov. 18. The map was originally created by Environment Canada, but I do a lot of “cleaning up” to make it more readable. For this reason some of the data has been lost, so the map should only be used to give a rough idea of how much snow cover there actually is.

Almanac, Canadian Farmers’ Almanac, and then for fun, my own forecast.

According to Environment Canada, winter is going to start off with below-average temperatures, especially over western parts of Alberta.

These below-average temperatures will continue into January and February with some moderation in temperatures late in the winter over eastern regions. Precipitation looks to be around average this winter according to EC, with northeastern parts of Alberta seeing the best chance of aboveaverage snowfall.

Over at the Old Farmer’s Almanac it is calling for temperatures to start off on the cold side in December, and then get downright bonechilling cold in January, before moderating back to near-average values in February. Precip-

itation will be near average in December, but it looks like it could get pretty snowy in January and February, with a call for above-average and then well-above-average amounts.

The Canadian Farmers Almanac is always a tougher one to figure out as its forecast simply describes the weather and doesn’t actually state whether any month will see above, below, or average conditions. So, I’ll have to try to interpret its information and turn it into a general forecast.

With this in mind this is what it looks like it is calling for this winter.

December is going to see near-average temperatures along with above-average amounts of snow. It even predicts a major snowstorm hitting the Prairies over Christmas. January will see nearaverage temperatures, but will

fluctuate from cold to warm during the month. Precipitation looks to be near to slightly above average. February will see colder-than-average temperatures with near-average amounts of snow.

Finally, here at Alberta Farmer, I’m calling for… let’s see, spin the wheel and… it looks like the winter will be a combination of EC’s forecast and the Canadian Farmers Almanac. Overall, I think temperatures will be cooler than average, but we will see several cold and warm snaps during the winter. Precipitation will be around average, but I do put the odds on seeing a significant winter storm this year fairly high, simply because I think we are due to see one!

All in all, I hope everyone has a great winter this year and that the weather brings you exactly what you wish for.

33

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

CASH-POOR USDA CUTS CATTLE REPORT

TYPHOON CROP DAMAGES $110 MLN

The U.S. Agriculture Department suspended its semi-annual U.S. cattle inventory report for a second year on Nov. 19 due to budget cuts that also affect certain rice, fish, fruit and vegetable estimates. USDA said because of automatic budget cuts, known as sequestration, “we are not able to reinstate the programs that were suspended in March” in the new fiscal year. The July cattle report was regarded as the broadest reaching of the reports, although many of the more obscure reports dealing with niche crops are also missed by participants in those markets. — Reuters

The typhoon that hit the Philippines has resulted in crop losses worth $110 million and an overall damage to the agriculture sector of more than twice that figure, preliminary estimates from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) showed. Some 153,495 hectares of rice paddy, maize and other high-value crops such as coconut, banana, cassava, mango and vegetables have been adversely affected by Typhoon Haiyan, which killed at least 3,900 people when it struck on Nov. 8. The damaged areas included some 77,476 ha of rice and 20,951 ha of maize, the FAO said in a statement. — Reuters

China doesn’t want to keep them down on the farm The government would like more workers in cities, but farmers have no incentive to give up title to their land

BY KEVIN YAO

CHENGDU, CHINA /REUTERS

T

an Yingyu is one of China’s 200 million migrant workers and like many he is stuck: he does not want to return to his village but also cannot become a legal resident in the city of Chengdu, where he has worked for nearly 20 years.

His dilemma highlights a key issue for China’s reformist leaders as they look for ways to encourage more people to move to cities to help turn a creditand investment-driven economy into a consumerpowered one.

If rural Chinese are given formal rights to their land, they could cash in its value and feel more secure about moving to work in cities. If they are given residency status in cities, rather than having it tied to their home village, they would have access to social welfare, making it more likely they would spend more or move their family to live in the cities too.

Without reform of land and residency rights, a government urbanization drive may fall behind, endangering broader economic reform and even risking social unrest.

“I won’t go back to work the land, but I cannot afford to buy a property here — prices are too high,” said Tan, pointing to towering apartment blocks in the southwestern city of Chengdu.

Top leaders are meeting in secret in Beijing to plot an economic agenda for the next decade, and will be looking at pilot schemes in Chengdu and elsewhere that are testing land and residency reform for clues on what changes to make.

But the Chengdu pilot program and others that allow farmers to lease or sell their land have shown the process is slow and tangled with problems.

Reforms in the 1980s assigned farmland to households but reserved formal ownership to the village collective. Land certificates are imprecise at best and many rural households lack documentation, although Beijing has tasked the provinces with registering title to land nationwide over the next five years.

The lack of clear land rights makes many farmers vulnerable to land grabs by local administrations for development, a major source of government revenue and equally a major source of discontent among farmers who say they are not compensated fairly.

Land reform and household registration are two key issues if China is to succeed in its plan to persuade 390 million rural dwellers — equivalent to the U.S. population — to migrate to urban areas. PHOTO: THINKSTOCK Another dilemma

Closely tied to land reform is a need to relax a rigid household registration system, which means Tan has no access to social welfare, such as medical care, outside of his home village. The lack of status reduces the incentive for rural Chinese to move to urban areas.

Tan does not want to formally cut his ties with his village because he cannot sell the fifth of a hectare of land his family has tended for more than 50 years.

It is now looked after by a relative.

But until he cuts his ties, he cannot register as a resident of Chengdu, where he trades in second-hand furniture and appliances.

Land reform and household registration are two key issues if China is to succeed in its plan to persuade 390 million rural dwellers — equivalent to the U.S. population — to migrate to urban areas.

That itself is central to the broader plan to develop an economy led more by domestic consumption as Beijing looks for new economic drivers after three decades of double-digit growth.

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Even if farmers or rural households do not want to lease or sell their land, the lack of recognized legal rights reduces their incentive to develop businesses where they live.

The pilot programs in Chengdu and other cities have been testing reforms of the established land rules, rooted in China communist ideology, and the household registration system, which dates back to 1958.

The project in Chengdu allows farmers or village landholders to sell their land rights on an exchange, getting cash in return. But the watchword is caution.

“The steps cannot be too big,” said Hou Peng, a senior official at the Chengdu Agriculture Equity Exchange.

“Land reforms are very complicated. The interests of many people will be affected,” Hou told Reuters in an interview inside the exchange’s new building, where big electronic screens display land deals.

Hou said land reform has to be gradual to maintain social stability by ensuring farmers do not rush to sell their land before they have secured long-term jobs in cities. The last thing that the central government would want is cities filling rapidly with unemployed migrants.

Collateral

One option being considered is to allow farmers to use land rights to secure bank loans, or turn them into shares in large-scale farming companies, government economists say.

Possibly the biggest difficulty reformers have to overcome is an inherent conflict of interest on the part of local authorities where migrants are registered.

Compensating them fairly for land sales would help achieve national urbanization goals. But seizure of farmland by local governments, with little or no compensation, is widespread and sparks tens of thousands of protests a year.

A Tsinghua University survey showed that 64 million Chinese households have had their land seized or homes demolished over decades of rapid urbanization, leaving many feeling disaffected.

“The government says it is building the new countryside, but the purpose is to appropriate our land for their own development,” said one 62-year-old farmer.

His house was demolished earlier this year and he has been promised a new home in two or three years.

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34

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

U.S. Appeals Court halts horse-slaughter inspections The ruling temporarily blocks three plants from processing horses

BY TERRY BAYNES REUTERS

A

federal Appeals Court granted an emergency request by animal protection groups Nov. 3 to temporarily block the U.S. government from conducting inspections of horses destined for slaughter.

The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver issued a temporary injunction barring the U.S. Department of Agriculture from providing horsemeat inspection services to Roswell, New Mexico-based Valley Meat Co., Responsible Transportation, in Iowa, and Rains Natural Meats, in Missouri.

The order comes after a U.S. district judge in New Mexico ear-

lier threw out a lawsuit, which the Humane Society of the United States and other animal protection groups had filed in July, that sought to permanently halt the slaughter of horses.

The suit alleged that the Department of Agriculture failed to carry out environmental reviews before it gave approval to the three companies to slaughter horses for human consumption.

The district judge had found that the grants of inspection were properly issued and dismissed the lawsuit, clearing the way for the equine killing to resume.

However, in an emergency request to the 10th Circuit on Nov. 3, the animal protection groups argued that an emergency injunction was necessary

to prevent environmental harm and the violation of federal environmental laws while their appeal is pending. A two-judge panel of the 10th Circuit granted that request.

Horsemeat cannot be sold as food in the United States, but it can be exported. The meat is sold for human consumption in China, Russia, Mexico and other countries and is sometimes used as feed for zoo animals.

Congress effectively banned horse slaughter in 2006 by saying the USDA could not spend any money to inspect the plants.

Without USDA inspectors, slaughterhouses cannot operate.

The ban had been extended a year at a time as part of USDA funding bills, but the language was omitted in 2011.

PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

Groups have argued for years about whether a ban on slaughter would save horses from an inhumane death or

New charitable foundation launched by SeedMaster

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askatchewan manufacturer SeedMaster is establishing a philanthropic foundation to mark its 10th anniversary.

The foundation, Social Entrepreneurship by Design (SED), invites community fundraising groups in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta and the U.S. Midwest to apply for grants ranging from $1,000 to $10,000.

“Instead of just applying SED money to a fundraiser’s bottom line, the funds will be used in an entrepreneurial way that helps generate even more money for their charitable cause than they’d originally imagined,” said SeedMaster marketing manager Cory Beaujot in a release. “We want to encourage community fundraising groups to dream bigger about the possibilities they can achieve by using SED funds to make more money for their projects.”

For example, one rural Saskatchewan volunteer fire department used its SED grant to bring in a comedy performance as a fundraiser.

SeedMaster is committing $100,000 annually to SED, and expects to fund up to 20 fundraising projects each year. The company plans to invite other businesses and organizations to support the foundation by becoming Gold SED with donations of $10,000 each to benefit as many communities as possible.

More information on how the program works and how communities can apply can be found at www.seedmaster.ca/sed.

35

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Young Canadians win big in New Zealand Two Albertans share their experiences with handling cattle in a world competition

BY JOHNNIE BACHUSKY AF CONTRIBUTOR /INNISFAIL

L

ast month Jared Hunter left Canada for a week in New Zealand as just your average farm boy from Didsbury, and came home a world champion.

The 24-year-old young man was part of a 12-member Canadian delegation, split into three teams, that competed in the inaugural youth program at the 2013 World Angus Forum Youth Program in Rotorua, North Island, New Zealand. “It was great. New Zealand is quite a green country. They do agriculture definitely different down there,” Hunter said.

“I am first a farm kid, then a cow breeder and I have a job to keep that addiction going.”

JARED HUNTER

Markerville’s Chad Lorenz also competed on another Canadian team that brought home honours for champion team presentation. “It was definitely a great experience,” said the 20-yearold, who is the current junior Angus ambassador for Canada.

During the five-day event he

Angus champs: (l to r) Michael Hargrave, Ont., Patrick Holland, Maritimes, Melissa McRae, Brandon, Man. and Jared Hunter, Didsbury, Alta. gave a presentation at the World Angus Secretariat meeting as to what Canada is doing to promote youth in agriculture with the Angus breed. “The two things I enjoyed most were touring the ranch operations there and making contacts with the people,” said Lorenz, whose family farms northwest of Markerville with 100 purebred Angus cattle.

Hunter has been a passionate Angus breeder all his life. His parents have bred Angus cattle at their farm east of Didsbury for years and currently own about 150 cows. Hunter, who splits his

life between the farm and his home in Penhold, raises about 20 of his own Angus cows at the family farm.

“My grandparents raised red Angus breed, and my parents have had purebred Angus since the early 1980s,” said Hunter, who also works as a customer sales representative for the UFA farm store in Red Deer. “I am first a farm kid, then a cow breeder and I have a job to keep that addiction going.”

Last winter Hunter was attracted to a Canadian Angus Foundation notice that it was

looking for worthy young cattlemen and women to compete at the forum. The foundation received about 25 applicants.

“The selection committee was tasked to pick contestants for an all-expenses-paid trip to New Zealand and we had to write an essay on what we wanted to achieve once we got there, and send in a list of accomplishments of what we had done with the Angus breed and how we wanted to be a part of it in the future,” said Hunter, who was one of 12 winners selected for the competition.

The applicants were split into three Canadian teams, which were facing off against competitors from New Zealand, Australia and Great Britain.

Hunter’s team included Patrick Holland from Montague, Prince Edward Island; Melissa McRae from Brandon, Manitoba and Michael Hargrave from Maxwell, Ontario. Hunter was named team captain.

After arriving in New Zealand Hunter’s team immediately set off to compete in the five-section contest, that was spread out over five days with a different event each day with 40 heifers and 40 competitors. The competition included scoring events for general knowledge, parading (presentation, showmanship and sportsmanship with an Angus animal), stock judging, animal preparation and agri-sports — a hands-on team challenge involving dayto-day tasks. “We had lots of time to visit with other competitors,” said Hunter. “I was kind of surprised the Americans didn’t come. Actually Argentina was supposed to send a team but they didn’t come.”

Along with capturing the inaugural world championship title, Hunter’s team also brought home $10,000 in prize money. “We haven’t decided what we are going to do with the money officially,” he said.

“There was some comment we were going to put it towards the next team that’s going to the next youth competition and that is in Mexico in 2015.”

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36

news » livestock

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

4-H summer assistant positions

AgriProfit$ newsletter for cattlemen

Alberta 4-H is looking for three summer assistants to provide co-ordination, planning and administrative support for summer events, livestock shows and summer programs. Applicants must have completed one year of post-secondary education, and must be able to travel. Familiarity with 4-H is an asset. Deadline for resumé and application submission is Dec. 1, 2013. For more information and to apply, contact Katelyn Strang, 4-H specialist, programs 403-948-8509 or katelyn.strang@gov.ab.ca.

The latest AgriProfit$ newsletter for Alberta Cattlemen is now available on the Alberta Agriculture website. The feature story in this issue is Chris Panter’s annual market fundamentals and outlook article reviewing some of the short- and intermediate-term signals in the marketplace and how these might play out in production and profit opportunities. There is also a rundown on this fall’s Cow/Calf-enomic workshops. To be added to the list contact Dale Kaliel at 780-427-5390 or at dale.kaliel@gov.ab.ca.

ABP chairman Doug Sawyer reflects on his term in office Doug Sawyer is stepping down after two years as chair of Alberta Beef Producers.

Editor Will Verboven recently sat down with him in his Calgary office Was the chairman’s job what you expected as to the responsibilities and time commitment?

How has your relationship with the provincial government been over the past two years?

Yes it has. I was on the board for several years so I had a pretty good idea what the job was all about and what the issues of the day were. I knew the time commitment was considerable, but that can still be a surprise when you include all the travel involved.

I feel it’s been good, we meet regularly with them and keep them aware of our position. The government played an understanding and helpful role in the national non-refundable checkoff discussions. We understand that maintaining a close and ongoing relationship with the government is critical and it’s an important part of what we do for producers. We also try to maintain a friendly relationship with the other political parties.

What has been the single biggest issue that the ABP has had to deal with over the past two years?

The most important was the XL Foods E. coli meat recall.

That caused a disaster for cattle marketing at every level and we saw prices drop. It was also one of the more frustrating issues with the media. We spent a lot of time explaining our position and the impact on the industry but in the end we received very little coverage particularly from city media.

The other issue was something of a carry-over and it was the agreement on the mandatory national cattle checkoff. It took up a lot a time and it went down to the wire. That checkoff remains very important from a national perspective as it funds many of our national research and promotion programs. It’s also important so we can levy imports. But the issue does take a lot of our time that could be used better on other matters.

How critical has the refundable checkoff issue become to ABP activities?

It is at a point now that it is seriously beginning to affect our investment into research, local promotion and a number of issues that directly affect producers. It looks like we are going to see a refund level of up to 30 per cent. If that rate continues to rise it is going to affect our contribution to the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association, that support is not covered by the mandatory national checkoff. Our reduced

Is a return to a a full non-refundable checkoff still being discussed?

Yes it is, the ABP passed a resolution on that issue so we try to work on it. It comes up in our discussions with the government. With such a large refund demand it has become much more important as to what the industry can do with research and development support. The government is aware of the refund situation and its negative impact and we are hoping to see it further discussed.

Doug Sawyer says the XL Foods recall was one of the most challenging issues during his term. Supplied photo income affects our ability to significantly match government grants in research — that is going to hurt the industry in the long run.

How has the ABP relationship fared with the Alberta Cattle Feeders Association (ACFA) over the past two years?

I feel it has been a good relationship, we came to an understanding with them over the non-refundable national checkoff so that was positive.

We have regular meetings with their executive to discuss issues of concern and how we can work together. In the end we can’t agree on everything, they have their views and we

have ours, particularly since we have to look at issues from the entire industry.

research critical to feeders such as support for better forage and silage barley varieties.

How well do you feel the ABP Feeder Council is working considering the presence of the ACFA as the voice of that sector?

ABP is expanding its “Alberta Beef” label promotion into B.C. Will that be in competition or displace any “Canadian Beef” label promotion from Canada Beef Inc.?

I am happy with the way the feeder council has worked on behalf of that sector. They are able to take feeder industry issues directly to our board on an ongoing basis, particularly as they relate to the entire cattle industry. They are also able to look at any research issues that are important to them and make recommendations to the board. We have helped fund some pretty significant

I see both labels being used, and no I don’t see it as competition for the Canadian Beef label. Alberta Beef is an iconic label that remains useful in promoting beef and if it can be used outside of Alberta then that’s good for selling our beef.

As to it being used in other parts of the country I guess we will have to look at the value.

Does ABP have a position on the recently released South Saskatchewan Regional Plan?

We feel the draft document has addressed many of the concerns we had with the process and specific issues like grazing leases.

This plan affects a very large part of our industry so it’s important that it protects our concerns.

Public meetings on the draft will be held and I expect producers will be making their views known directly. We will look forward to the final document.

What’s next for Doug Sawyer? Are you going to continue your representation with other organizations?

I am interested in continuing with other organizations. I will be serving on the executive as past president, and will see where else I can go to serve the industry.

37

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Strawberry foot rot is on the increase in feedlots Beef 911 } An infection previously mostly found in dairy

cattle is showing up in some western feedlots By roy lewis, dvm

I

t has come to my attention that “strawberry foot rot” or “hairy heel wart” or “Montellaros disease,” which was once considered a dairy disease is now making its way into feedlots in Eastern Canada. The disease is potentially caused by a treponema bacteria. The infection starts at the back of the hoof on or near the bulbs of the foot and works its way down. It causes a reddened, raised wart-like lesion surrounded by long hair, hence the descriptive names.

It can be confused by the true foot rot, which starts between the toes at the front of the hoof. Both conditions make cattle very sore but with strawberry foot rot the first cases go unnoticed because there is not much swelling evident at first.

Cattle generally contract this disease from constant exposure to moisture which is why some dairies have a high incidence of it. Feedlots can have outbreaks, especially when moist and cattle need to move through sloppy manure to get to feed bunks. The excessive moisture combined with those cattle immunosuppressed and abrasions to the feet will result in strawberry foot rot.

It is important to be recognized early, as the organism is sensitive to a fairly broad range of antibiotics. Tetracyclines are one of the families of antibiotics that are effective. They are injectable early, or wrapping the area in gauze soaked with tetracycline has also proven beneficial. Some

dairy practitioners have even gone to spraying especially the backs of the feet with a tetracycline liquid. Treat ments of topical low-strength iodine, chlorhexidine or peroxide have also at times been effective.

The cattle are extremely sore with this condition and often it affects both hind feet.

Affected calves just want to lay around so subsequent weight gain is severely affected. In some feedlot calves the condition becomes so severe that shipping (once antibiotics are withdrawn) or humane euthanasia are the only solutions, so it is important to recognize it early.

If any foot trimming or hoof care is attempted on these cases, thoroughly disinfect and clean the instruments.

Also clean yourself, as it may be zoonotic (transferrable to humans) and lead to infections of the hands and arms.

Prevention

The most effective preventive in the dairies has been first to maintain good hoof care and keeping the nutrition sound. Trace minerals such as zinc, calcium, phosphorus as well as vitamins A, D and E have been associated with good feet integrity. There is a vaccine in the U.S. against it which is somewhat effective apparently but it is not available in Canada yet.

The other preventives in dairies and that may need to be adapted for feedlots are footbaths with various products in them to routinely keep the treponema and other organisms at bay. Products such as formaldehyde (one gallon 37 per cent in 19 gallons of

Probiotics could serve as alternative to antibiotics in pig feed

water), copper sulphate (five lbs. in nine gallons of water) or even dry footbaths of lime with tetracycline powder have been tried.

With footbaths it is critical that two long footbaths be strung together so the first one simply washes off organic material and the second is the treatment footbath. Footbaths must be long enough and wide and deep enough so the affected area is treated. Copper sulphate does not do well in organic material that is why the pre-wash is critical. Ideally it is best to have a space between water baths to allow the organic material to run off and upon exiting the water bath best to have the cattle in a dry pen for 15-30 minutes but I know that might be hard to implement. It’s best if the footbaths are in the nine- to 15-feet-long range, three feet wide and six inches deep. This way the entire foot is exposed and this may be repeated daily or some do it twice weekly.

I have personally seen a few Ontario feedlots where the footbaths were easily rigged up in the processing alley and the cattle could almost be trained to run through it after a couple of times. This seems to be keeping the organism at bay. Treatment rates vary from daily to a couple times a week until clinical signs subside.

Going aggressively after the bad ones early with the tetracycline wraps is also worth the effort and the individual care will pull these through.

Dairy producers under the advice of their veterinarians are also spraying the bulbs of the feet with Lincospectin and avoiding the water baths but this may not be

Cases of strawberry foot rot may go unnoticed because there is not much swelling evident at first. PHOTo: Lely practical in a feedlot, though could be done to the clinical cases. Strawberry foot rot is also emerging as a significant disease in some feedlots out west, similar to the emerging sporadic condition necrosis of P3 documented recently.

We need to work on prevention by controlling wet conditions and communicate with each other advancements in either prevention or treatment of this very painful,

contagious and productionlimiting disease. Talk to your veterinarian and be ready to implement their best management practices to minimize the incidence of hairy heel wart in your feedlot or dairy.

Roy Lewis is a large-animal veterinarian practising at the Westlock, Alberta Veterinary Centre. His main interests are bovine reproduction and herd health.

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The probiotic inhibited pathogenic E. coli from establishing Staff

G

erman researchers have found that piglets fed probiotic Enterococcus faecium showed reduced numbers of potentially pathogenic Escherichia coli strains in their intestines, the American Society for Microbiology says in a release.

Researchers were looking for alternatives to antibiotics for reducing pathogens in the intestines of young pigs following the EU’s ban on using antibiotics as growth promotors in 2006.

“We found a clear reduction of E. coli strains possessing typical genes for extra-intestinal pathogenic E. coli (ExPEC),” said researcher Carmen Bednorz of Freie Universitat Berlin, Germany. The reduction was particularly noticeable in strains that adhere to the intestinal mucosa (and less so in the feces), which

was “very interesting,” she says, because “ExPEC typically harbour a lot of adhesion genes that promote colonization of the mucosa.

“Our data suggest that the feeding of probiotics could substitute for antimicrobials as growth promoters,” says Bednorz. “This could help to reduce the burden of antimicrobial resistance,” she adds.

The study was published ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

In the study, Bednorz and her collaborators compared piglets fed with E. faecium to those in a control group. They collected more than 1,400 samples of E. coli from piglets of different ages, and from different parts of the intestine.

The results suggest that E. faecium inhibits pathogenic E. coli from becoming attached to the intestinal mucosa.

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38

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Country-of-origin labelling appeal gaining U.S. support

About 100 state-level senators have signed on to the appeal to halt the implementation of country-of-origin labelling in the U.S.

BY JENNIFER BLAIR AF STAFF/ RED DEER

F

Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz says the list of retaliatory measures to be taken against U.S. products is having the desired effect.

ederal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz has one thing to say about country-of-origin labelling (COOL): “It’s not cool.”

In the midst of an appeal to quash COOL in the United States, Ritz has been working to gain supporters in the U.S. in an effort to halt non-science-based trade practices that could have far-reaching implications for Canadian agriculture.

“COOL has the potential to really send shock waves through our industry, right back into the feed grain sector. It certainly creates a tremendous disparity on our livestock sector,” Ritz said during a recent interview at the Red Deer Agri-Trade event.

And the potential economic impact of COOL continues to climb. “We’re seeing that number grow to some 10 cents a pound in cattle, and the pork number is almost doubling,” Ritz said. “It’s to the point where, like a good investment portfolio, you have to have more than one buyer, and that’s what we’re seeking to do with the agreement in the European Union and working in the Pacific Rim to get more access there, so we’re not just dependent on the U.S. market.”

Though the U.S. is Canada’s largest trading partner, Ritz says the relationship has become one sided. “At the same time the Americans talk a good deal on the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) and expanding trade, they do everything within their power

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to make it on their terms only.

That’s not good trade policy.”

Like other non-science-based trade barriers, Minister Ritz sees COOL as “a political solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.” Consumers in the U.S. are well versed in the similarities between our science-based food safety approach and the way we raise our cattle, Ritz said.

“There’s a number of times those animals can and do cross the border back and forth as they’re finished and end up on someone’s dinner table. There isn’t the concern that COOL tends to try to address.”

“COOL has the potential to really send shock waves through our industry, right back into the feed grain sector.”

GERRY RITZ

U.S. meetings

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As Canadian, Mexican and American meat sectors work on the appeal, Ritz has been meeting with state senators and congressmen to reinforce to those who are sitting on the fence that “it’s not comfortable there.”

In the six months since the injunction to stop the implementation of COOL failed, about 100 American state-level senators have signed on to support the appeal.

“There’s been a huge ground shift down there,” Ritz said.

The sudden change in attitudes may be in response to the promise of retaliatory measures against the U.S. if they proceed with implementing COOL. In June, the Government of Canada released a lengthy list of items imported by the U.S. that may be targeted, including fresh meat, processed foods and other agricultural products.

“Our list is concerning to a lot of state-level senators and congressmen, and that’s intentionally why it’s done,” Ritz said. “It’s to give as comprehensive a list as possible to show them that there will be harm that goes back to the U.S., as well as a higher price to the consumers of pork and beef products in the U.S.” Non-science-based trade barriers are a growing concern in Canada’s agriculture industry, according to the minister. “They’re far more hurtful than the actual tariff barriers because they’re applied in an indiscriminate way, and there’s no way to adjust the market for them. They sort of catch you out of the blue.”

The Canadian government is looking at other such trade barriers as well, including those related to low-level presences of GM crops and maximum residue limits in grain. “The efficacy of testing now is so much more that zero is no longer zero,” said Minister Ritz, adding that Canada is not immune. “We have zero tolerance, and we’ve begun the consultations on how we move away from that plateau as well.” jennifer.blair@fbcpublishing.com

39

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Farrowing rate — going back to basics and attention to detail PEET ON PIGS  Five key areas of management were found

to need improvement on farms surveyed

BY BERNIE PEET

Breeding techniques and protocols

M

aximizing farrowing rate requires a focus on the basic aspects of management and close attention to detail, Steinbach, Manitobabased veterinarian Dr. Blaine Tully told delegates at the recent Red Deer Swine Technology Workshop.

He was describing the findings from his work carrying out fertility assessments on swine farms across Canada over the last three years. “Very few of our conclusions reveal ‘new’ information about sow reproduction,” he said. “In other words, 95 per cent of farms with suboptimal fertility and therefore reduced farrowing rates have very similar deficiencies in the execution of basic breeding barn tasks.” This applies to all types and sizes of farm, whether using natural service or AI, he added.

Tully stressed the importance of farrowing rate on overall breeding herd output and profit. “Maximizing farrowing rate and achieving a consistent level allows breeding targets to be set and achieved, driving uniform pig flow for customers downstream, right through to the packer,” he pointed out.

“Suboptimal farrowing rate will increase the cost of production by increasing non-productive days (NPDs). On many farms, we also find a link between reduced farrowing rate and litter size.” He noted that the opportunity cost of a five per cent reduction in farrowing target on a 1,000-sow unit was about $71,000 annually in the breeding herd alone.

Tully said that the value of the fertility audit was in viewing procedures with an outside set of eyes and providing a different perspective. It also allows the relevant farm protocols to be reviewed in the light of what is observed on farm and the results achieved.

It’s the boar’s fault!

Boar management is top of Tully’s list of five key areas of management that are found to need improvement on the farms he has surveyed. Too often the boar is blamed for poor outcomes, when in reality he is not being managed properly.

“The boar has three main jobs — stimulation of the female brain, help with heat detection and stimulation during and after insemination, which assists semen transportation up the reproductive tract,” he explained. “In order for the boar to perform all of these tasks well, he needs to be trained and managed from an early age to drive a high libido.”

Tully stressed the importance of using boars that produce a large amount of frothy saliva, containing pheromones which stimulate the sow’s brain and impact the release of reproductive hormones. The Chinese Meishan breed is an ideal boar for stimulation as it is smaller and early maturing, has a very high libido and produces lots of pheromones, Tully said. In addition, he suggested, a number of different boars should be used

Boar exposure should be provided to gilts from 180 to 210 days of age and the date of observed estrus recorded, says Manitoba vet Dr. Blaine Tully. for heat detection, because sows show varying levels of attraction for different boars.

It is essential to allow boars used for heat detection and stimulation in AI systems to serve sows or gilts naturally once per week, Tully believes. This helps to maintain libido and keep them keen, he says.

Sow and gilt management

Second on Tully’s list is management of the sow after weaning, in particular maximizing feed intake from weaning to breeding.

“Feed a lactation diet with a higher energy and protein level than the gestation diet, feed sows twice per day and group sows by condition to prevent the big-

ger sows stealing from thinner sows,” he advised. “Much of the success in the breeding barn will depend on the energy balance and body condition of weaned sows following lactation.”

Tu l l y a l s o r e c o m m e n d e d boar stimulation of weaned sows daily following weaning, in order to stimulate the onset of estrus. He noted that this also results in more effective detection of sows with a short wean-to-estrus interval.

Trait Stewardship Responsibilities Notice to Farmers Monsanto Company is a member of Excellence Through Stewardship® (ETS). Monsanto products are commercialized in accordance with ETS Product Launch Stewardship Guidance, and in compliance with Monsanto’s Policy for Commercialization of Biotechnology-Derived Plant Products in Commodity Crops. This product has been approved for import into key export markets with functioning regulatory systems. Any crop or material produced from this product can only be exported to, or used, processed or sold in countries where all necessary regulatory approvals have been granted. It is a violation of national and international law to move material containing biotech traits across boundaries into nations where import is not permitted. Growers should talk to their grain handler or product purchaser to confirm their buying position for this product. Excellence Through Stewardship® is a registered trademark of Excellence Through Stewardship.

ALWAYS READ AND FOLLOW PESTICIDE LABEL DIRECTIONS. Roundup Ready® crops contain genes that confer tolerance to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup® brand agricultural herbicides. Roundup® brand agricultural herbicides will kill crops that are not tolerant to glyphosate. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for corn is a combination of four separate individually-registered products, which together contain the active ingredients metalaxyl, trifloxystrobin, ipconazole, and clothianidin. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for canola is a combination of two separate individually-registered products, which together contain the active ingredients difenoconazole, metalaxyl (M and S isomers), fludioxonil, thiamethoxam, and bacillus subtilis. Acceleron and Design®, Acceleron®, DEKALB and Design®, DEKALB®, Genuity and Design®, Genuity Icons, Genuity®, RIB Complete and Design®, RIB Complete®, Roundup Ready 2 Technology and Design®, Roundup Ready 2 Yield®, Roundup Ready®, Roundup Transorb®, Roundup WeatherMAX®, Roundup®, SmartStax and Design®, SmartStax®, Transorb®, VT Double PRO®, YieldGard VT Rootworm/RR2®, YieldGard Corn Borer and Design and YieldGard VT Triple® are trademarks of Monsanto Technology LLC. Used under license. LibertyLink® and the Water Droplet Design are trademarks of Bayer. Used under license. Herculex® is a registered trademark of Dow AgroSciences LLC. Used under license. Respect the Refuge and Design is a registered trademark of the Canadian Seed Trade Association. Used under license. ©2013 Monsanto Canada Inc.

10801A-Gen Legal Trait Stewardship-AF.indd 1 7/26/13 2:33 PM

The gilt development program is the third important area of management and farms should have a well-defined protocol, which includes acclimatization procedures, boar exposure, recording of dates of estrus, feeding and weight/age at breeding, Tully said. “Boar exposure should be provided from 180 to 210 days of age and the date of observed estrus recorded,” he suggested.

Problem area No. 4 is the techniques used during insemination, notably hygiene, sow stimulation and semen storage.

“The stockperson should provide the stimulation given by the boar during natural service,” Tully said. “This includes back pressure and kneading the sow’s flanks. Another good stimulus is to rub the udder, which releases oxytocin, which stimulates sperm transport.” Once insemination is complete, he advised that a ‘followup’ boar is placed in front of sows for further stimulation.

Finally, Tully said, breeding protocols and the way in which they are being implemented should be reviewed periodically.

“Veterinarians visit many farms where the intended protocol, be that for biosecurity, vaccination, feeding or breeding is not actually followed through consistently by all farm staff,” he noted. “I find that helping staff to understand some of the basic reproductive physiology behind the breeding protocols helps to keep motivation high, and prevent deviation from some of the intended procedures. Once a level of understanding about why we do certain things in the barn is reached, then fine tuning of the procedures can take place.”

Bernie Peet is president of Pork Chain Consulting of Lacombe, Alberta and a director of U.K.-based Pig Production Training Ltd.

2013 ConferenCe December 3rd & 4th, 2013

Location: Lethbridge Lodge, 320 Scenic Dr. S.

Keynote presenters include: Dr. Martin Parry Rothamsted Research – Harpenden, UK Drew Lerner World Weather Inc – Kansas City, MO Other highlights include: Dr. Ross McKenzie Orville Yanke Award Recipient – Lethbridge, AB Kelly Taylor Comedian – Prince Albert, SK Plus many more including: Don Huber, Merle Good, Dr. Shelley Hoover, Dr. Jan Slaski, Dr. Chantal Hamel, Ken Coles, Nevin Rosaasen, Scott Meers, Dr. Surya Acharya & MORE

for further information visit: www.farmingsmarter.com or call (403) 381-5118

40

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

Full traceability for pigs takes effect July 1

Genomics show promise in battling swine diseases

A new, Canada-wide traceability system is on the way for pork producers, but so far no one in Manitoba has bellied up to the trough

Livestock Gentec researchers target PRRS and PCVD 2

By Alexis Kienlen

By Shannon VanRaes

af staff /edmonton

staff

R

I

t’s coming, so you might as well prepare.

PigTrace — a nationwide traceability initiative — is expected to come into force on July 1, 2014, following changes to the federal Health of Animals Regulation.

But so far, pork producers aren’t jumping on board.

“The compliance rate across Canada is pretty low — no one is officially on the program right now,” said Jeff Clark, manager of national traceability for the Canadian Pork Council. “People do traceability, the issue is that they’re not reporting it to our central system.”

But producers need to start using the PigTrace system well before next summer’s deadline, so they can get used to it and work out any kinks, Clark told a recent Manitoba Pork Council meeting in Portage la Prairie, Man. “The tools are there to do it now, but human nature being what it is, we often don’t do things until we have to,” he said. “My message to producers is, please learn about this program now... so people aren’t scrambling come July 1, when it’s required.”

Not surprisingly, the topic of tags was quick to surface at the meeting.

PigTrace allows identification through both ear tags and shoulder slap tattoos, but the tags must be used on all swine destined for fairs, auctions and inter-farm transfers. Pigs being imported into Canada must also sport the new ear tag, while those going directly from farm to slaughter can be batch tagged.

Jeff Clark is urging producers to look into traceability requirements sooner rather than later. PHOTo: Shannon VanRaes Tags are available for sale now, but supplies are flowing slowly as Clark, the program’s lone facilitator, waits for additional federal funding to come through.

The system is designed to increase security and food safety in the event of a disease outbreak.

“CPC’s PigTrace Canada program aims to provide animal health and food safety officials with the best possible information regarding pig identification and movement by requiring anyone handling pigs to report movement information within seven days,” said Oliver Haan, chair of the pork council’s ID and traceability committee.

“Mandating PigTrace through federal regulation is an important step towards building a successful system that responds quickly to disease outbreaks and food safety emergencies.”

But it’s also designed to protect

Canadian pork producers and processors from costly disruptions, Clark said.

And with a new trade deal between Canada and the European Union on the horizon, he added that the nationwide traceability program will also improve market access.

“The European Union has had a history of a strong interest in traceability systems,” said Clark. “A lot of my colleagues in the other livestock commodity groups expect that the EU market will require traceability systems behind our meat products.”

Details of the PigTrace program and producer requirements can be found at www.pigtrace.ca.

Other livestock sectors will follow suit at a later date. shannon.vanraes@fbcpublishing.com with files from Alex Binkley in Ottawa

esearchers at the University of Alberta’s Livestock Gentec centre are using genomics to identify pigs that are less susceptible to disease.

Genomics is a discipline in genetics that studies the function and structure of genomes — the complete set of DNA within a single cell of an organism.

At a recent conference, Livestock Gentec researcher Jamie Wilkinson said the goals of the project are to identify pigs which are less susceptible to diseases and need less medication.

The researchers are using genomics to learn what makes animals less genetically susceptible to the two viruses that have the greatest economic impact on swine production worldwide — porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) and porcine circovirus 2 (PCVD 2).

PRRS targets the immune system and is difficult to overcome as it’s an airborne disease that can travel between farms. It’s difficult to create vaccines that work effectively against PRRS. It affects sow and gilt reproduction, slows the growth of young animals and results in respiratory tract diseases. “We’ve had it in the industry since the late 1980s and it’s still one of the biggest problems in the swine industry,” said Wilkinson.

PCVD 2 is a collection of different disease symptoms all caused by the same virus. Pigs that have PCVD 2 appear wasted and small.

They show signs of weight loss, enlarged lymph nodes and difficulty breathing. There are effec-

tive vaccines available for this disease, but other tools are needed.

The swine improvement project is a three-year project with $12 million of funding from Genome Canada and other sources in Canada and the U.S.

“We’re about twothirds through, so we’re getting a lot of interesting results.”

Jamie Wilkinson Livestock Gentec

Pig Gen Canada, an organization of swine genetic companies, is one of the funders and provides animals for the experiments.

Research began in July 2011.

“We’re about two-thirds through, so we’re getting a lot of interesting results,” said Wilkinson.

The researchers take DNA samples for every animal and have access to pedigree information.

“We’re looking at heritability and how much of the variation we see is genetic,” Wilkinson said.

The researchers have found that some of the traits are moderately heritable and one region of the pig chromosome has effects on viral load and weight gain. They have also identified a gene that is effective against multiple loads and strains of the virus. They’ve also found some genes that could be useful in further research. akienlen@fbcpublishing.com

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A new decision support tool to assist cattle producers in calculating their cost of production and risk exposure has been posted to Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development’s website.

Rancher’s Risk and Return is an Excel spreadsheet that takes an innovative approach to assessing the price risk for cow-calf and feedlot producers.

“The new calculator takes traditional cost of production calculations through to the assessment of financial risk and risk mitigation,” says Bruce Viney, risk management specialist with Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development. “The calculator estimates the financial risk effects from leverage, and measures the risk protection offered through livestock price insurance strategies.”

Rancher’s Risk and Return also helps producers calculate useful information when they are considering making structural changes to their operations or when they are considering the impacts of different borrowing levels. It can

easily show how sensitive an operation is to different selling prices and cattle price insurance coverage levels and these results are shown in easy-toread tables and graphs.

“Rancher’s Risk and Return assists in estimating the costs of home-raising replacement heifers and other activities from backgrounding to yearling grazing and through to various finishing scenarios,” says Viney. “The calculator is an easy-to-use enterprise analysis tool that is designed in two parts and is specific to cow-calf and feedlot enterprises. It has a great deal of flexibility to quickly provide valuable information using familiar cow-calf budgets and traditional feedlot profit projections.

“The big advancement from traditional models is the ability to quickly assess financial risk and calculate the costs and benefits of cattle price insurance strategies specific to your own farm or cattle feeding venture. While the Rancher’s Risk and Return modelling tool can get down into some detailed calculations, it still allows for easy what-if analyses and scenario comparisons.”

41

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

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Available at:

COMBINE WORLD located 20 min. E of Saskatoon, SK on Hwy. #16. 1 year warranty on all new, used, and rebuilt parts. Canada’s largest inventory of late model combines & swathers.

1-800-667-4515 www.combineworld.com We know that farming is enough of a gamble so if you want to sell it fast place your ad in the Alberta Farmer Express classifieds. It’s a Sure Thing. Call our toll-free number today. We have friendly staff ready to help.

1-888-413-3325.

1-888-413-3325 AUCTION SALES Auctions Various

AUCTION SERVICE LTD. General Auction Services since 1960

FARM, RANCH, REAL ESTATE & COMMERCIAL

Neerlandia, AB

(780) 674-3020 www.dseriescanola.ca

MORE OPTIONS TO SAVE YOU MONEY

Buy one province, buy two provinces or buy all three.

Great rates whatever you choose Contact Sharon

Email: sharon.komoski@fbcpublishing.com ALBERTA

Email: john@shieldsauctionservices.com • Phone: 403-464-0202

Neerlandia Coop Association Ltd.

Prairie-Wide Display Classifieds

Advertise in the Alberta Farmer Express Classifieds, it’s a Sure Thing!

AUCTION SALES Auctions Various

SHIELDS

577 engine and 438 sep/ it has 620/70R42" duals and 28L-26 2 speed rear axle, complete auto guide, ESP, chopper with spreader, yield and moisture loaded.

PARTNERSHIP AVAILABLE TO PERSON or persons having experience in Ag or Chicken operation.

North Calgary area, email hotsey@efirehose.net or mail PO Box 132 Irricana AB T0M 1B0.

AUTO & TRANSPORT AUTO & TRANSPORT Trucks

Available at:

Sturgeon Valley Fertilizers

BUILDINGS STEEL STORAGE CONTAINERS, 20-FT & 40-ft 1-866-517-8335, (403)540-4164, (403)226-1722

HEATED & GREEN CANOLA

Growing Forward 2 funding is available but you need to allow time for processing so don’t delay

$265,000 OBO

SASKATCHEWAN

43

ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA • NOVEMBER 25, 2013

FARM MACHINERY Sprayers

FARM MACHINERY Sprayers

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous

HEAT & AIR CONDITIONING

The Icynene Insulation System® JD 9400, 9420, 9520, 8970 JD 9860, 9760, 9750, 9650, 9600 JD 9430, 9530, 9630 Case STX 375, 425, 430, 450, 480, 500, 530 CIH 8010-2388, 2188 combine CIH 435Q, 535Q, 450Q, 550Q, 600Q pto avail.

JD 4710, 4720, 4730, 4830, 4920, 4930 SP sprayers JD 9770 & 9870 w/CM & duals CIH 3185, 3230, 3330, 4430, 4420 sprayers

• Sprayed foam insulation • Ideal for shops, barns or homes • Healthier, Quieter, More Energy Efficient®

CIH 9380 Quad w/ PTO and New motor 9280 Power Shift New Michelin Tires 9280 12 speed with 80% rubber 4720 JD Sprayer w/ boom track autosteer, 4700 90 ft very clean Fendt 920 low hrs GOOD SELECTION OF JD & CASE SP SPRAYERS AND 4WD TRACTORS

“LIKE MANY BEFORE, WE’LL HAVE YOU SAYING THERE’S NO DEAL LIKE A KEN DEAL” • Phone: (403)526-9644 • Cell: (403)504-4929 • Email: kendeal@shaw.ca FARM MACHINERY Tractors – Various Versatile 875 JD 4250 FWA, 280 loader JD 4440 Loader Available JD 2950 Complete with loader JD 7700 FWA loader JD 4230 JD 4020 Complete with loader JD 2550, FWA ST 250 Stagger, tires 20.8 x 38 new Mustang 2044 Skidsteer, 1300 Hrs. Clamp on Duals, 20.8x38-18.4x38 158 & 148, 265, 740.280, JD loaders FINANCE, TRADES WELCOME 780-696-3527, BRETON, AB

Big Tractor Parts, Inc. Geared For The Future

STEIGER TRACTOR SPECIALIST

2009 EZEE-ON 7750 SERIES 2 Airdrill, 10-in spacing, double schute, stealth openers, 5-in rubber packers, 36 1/2-ft, cw/tow behind 3315 cart, $125,000 OBO; 2008 JD 4895 self-propelled swather, w/30-ft of honeybee header, $97,500 OBO; JD 1509 9-ft tandem disc, $7,000 OBO; 1997 JD 9400 4-whl drive tractor, 12-spd w/hi&low, $128,000; Conserva-pak 56-ft air drill, w/4400 tank, $150,000 OBO. Phone:(780)386-2220 or Cell(780)888-1278.

Farming is enough of a gamble, advertise in the Alberta Farmer Express classified section. It’s a sure thing.

1-888-413-3325.

Looking for a hand around the farm? Place a help wanted ad in the classifieds. Call 1-888-413-3325

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous

Available at:

www.penta.ca

Kneehill Soil Services Ltd.

LIVESTOCK

Linden, AB

LIVESTOCK Cattle – Black Angus

(403) 546-4050

Bioriginal Food & Science Corp., based in Saskatoon, is actively buying Organic Flax from the 2013 crop year.

If interested, please send an 8lb sample* to the following address: Attn: Sandy Jolicoeur Bioriginal Food & Science Corp.

102 Melville Street Saskatoon, Saskatchewan S7J 0R1 *Please state the Variety & Quantity for Sale

For more information, please contact Sandy at:

306-975-9251 306-975-1166 purchasing@bioriginal.com

December 4, 2013

VJV Foothills Livestock Auction 130+ Bulls All Bulls will be HD 50K tested

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Wanted

Our success is measured by our customers success

WANTED: NH 8500 ROUND bale wagon. Phone (406)883-2118

David & Margaret Bolduc 403-549-3833

Dyce & Adrianna Bolduc 403-549-2228

LIVESTOCK Cattle – Simmental

Stretch your 1-888-413-3325

ORGANIC Organic – Grains

14th Annual Cudlobe Bull Sale

www.dseriescanola.ca

ADVERTISING DOLLAR!

1-800-587-4711

ORGANIC

Buy and Sell

anything you need through the

40 FULL BLOOD & PB Simmental cow herd, all papered, horned & polled. 40-yrs of selection for productivity & temperament. Call Chalk Hill Simmentals, Norman & Lila Weiss:(403)638-4269.

1-888-413-3325

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous

Why would you buy a used John Deere?

For the same reasons you’d buy new.

RED OR GREEN 1. 10-25% savings on new replacement parts for your Steiger drive train.

2. We rebuild axles, transmissions and dropboxes with ONE YEAR WARRANTY. 3. 50% savings on used parts.

1-800-982-1769 www.bigtractorparts.com

FARM MACHINERY Machinery Miscellaneous 1999 CAT 460 1,400 sep. hrs, rake up $80,000; 1998 AGCO 9755, 530/int electronic, 18spd p/s, 3096/hrs, 4 remotes, 540 front weights, duals, $44,000; 2005 MacDon 922, 16-ft DK, $14,000; 2000 MacDon 972, 25-ft DK, DS, pick-up reel, $16,000; Bergen swath mover, $3000.

(403)665-2341, Craigmyle, AB. ACREAGE EQUIPMENT: CULTIVATORS, DISCS, Plows, Blades, Post pounders, Haying Equipment, Etc. (780)892-3092, Wabamun, Ab.

RON SAUER

MACHINERY LTD. (403) 540-7691 ronsauer@shaw.ca

8570 JD 4WD Tractor 18.4 x 38 duals, 3 hyd., 3200 hours, premium unit, steer ready, shedded .... $75,000 895 Versatile 4WD Tractor - 30.5 x 32 M & 24.5 x 32 duals, 6,000 hrs., clean unit, runs great ................ $29,500 B 275 IHC Diesel Tractor, 3 pth, pto, runs good ......$4,250 31’ Flexicoil B Chisel Plow Extensions Included, extends to 41’, 3 bar harrows, excellent condition.............. $12,500 Flexicoil 6 Run Seed Treater .............................. $2,000 Wanted Flexicoil 39’ 5000 Air Drill, 9 or 10” spacing, 4” or 5.5” rubber packers ............................................ Call 134’ Flexicoil S68XL Sprayer, 2007, suspended boom, auto rate, joystick, rinse tank, triple quick jets, auto boom height, electric end nozzle & foam marker............. $39,500 100’ 65XL Flexicoil Sprayer, complete with windguards, elec. end nozzles dual tips, markers ........................ $5,500 30’ 8230 CIH PT Swather, PU reel, nice shape, . $10,000 25’ 8225 CIH PT Swather, PU reel, nice shape .... $9,500 25’ 1200 Hesston PT Swather, bat reel, good .... $5,500 30’ 4600 Prairie Star PT Swather, bat reel, good ....$5,500 30’ 1900 Premier PT Swather, bat reel, good .... $5,500 10 Wheel MATR (Italy) Trailer Type V-Hayrake, hyd. fold, as new.................................................. $5,000 14 Wheel Enorossi V-Hayrake extra contour wheels, as new .............................................................. $11,500 8 x 1200 Sakundiak Auger, 25 HP Koehler, Hawes mover, clutch, E-Kay bin sweep, nice condition ..................... $13,500 7 x 1200 Sakundiak Auger, 18 HP Koehler engine, looks and runs good..................................................$3,500 8 x 1400 Sakundiak Auger, 25HP Robin, Hawes mover, clutch, Wheatheart bin sweep, excellent condition...... $13,500 8 x 1400 Sakundiak Auger, 25 HP Koehler, Hawes mover, clutch, reversing gear box, lights, spout, Wheatheart sweep ...................................................$1,400 New E-Kay 7”, 8”, 9” Bin Sweeps .........................Call 1 Used E-Kay 9” Bin Sweep, complete ............. $1,250 Jiffy Feed Wagon, like new, hardly used, shedded .....$9,250 8” Wheat Heart Transfer Auger, as new............ $1,500 New Outback MAX & STX guidance & mapping ...In Stock New Outback E-Drive, TC’s .................................In Stock New Outback E-Drive X, c/w free E turns ............In Stock New Outback S-Lite guidance ................... In Stock $900 New Outback VSI Swather Steering Kit...........In Stock New Outback E-Drive Hyd. kit, JD 40 series ........ $1,000 Used Outback E-Drive Hyd. kit ...............................$500

There are many reasons to buy a pre-owned John Deere tractor or combine, and they all come down to one thing. Value.

Technology. Consider–a 3-year old John Deere 8R. When it came off the line it was AutoTrac™ Ready and JDLink™ enabled*. With one phone call to your dealer, you can begin using precision technology to help reduce inputs, improve yields, and get more done in less time.

Uptime. You can’t make money standing still. Pre-owned John Deere equipment, like a 9770 Combine, comes fully supported by your John Deere dealer. The pay-off: reliable, consistent performance, backed by an unrivaled dealer network.

Resale value. John Deere tractors and combines are among the best in the industry at holding their value. So when the time comes and you’re ready to trade up to another used or new John Deere tractor or combine, your investment delivers yet again.

Now is a great time to buy. Visit MachineƟnder.com to search our impressive selection of used John Deere equipment, then schedule some time with your John Deere dealer and ask about special pre-owned deals and incentives. Special Ɵnancing also available through John Deere Financial. New or new-to-you, Nothing Runs Like a Deere.™ *Activation/subscription required. Some additional accessories and/or components may be required. See dealer for details.

MachineFinder.com

**NuVision, Sakundiak & Farm King Augers, Outback GPS Systems, EK Auger Movers, Belt Tighteners, Bin Sweeps, & Crop Dividers, Kohler & Robin Subaru engines, Degelman, Headsight Harvesting Solutions, Greentronics Sprayer Boom Auto Height, Kello-Bilt Discs**

57240-3AE_8.125x10.indd 1

10/29/13 7:37 AM

44

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 • ALBERTAFARMEXPRESS.CA

PEDIGREED SEED Specialty – Various

SEED/FEED MISCELLANEOUS Feed Grain FEED GRAIN WANTED! ALSO buying; Light, tough, or offgrade grains. “On Farm Pickup” Westcan Feed & Grain 1-877-250-5252

Bioriginal Food & Science Corp., based in Saskatoon, are looking to contract Borage acres for the upcoming 2014 growing season.

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SEED/FEED MISCELLANEOUS Feed Grain

NOW BUYING OATS!

ALL GRADES

TIRES FEDERATION TIRE: 1100X12, 2000X20, used aircraft. Toll free 1-888-452-3850

Competitive Rates Prompt Payment

Great profit potential based on yield, prices and low input costs.

Attractive oil premiums and free seed delivery and on-farm pick-up.

PAUL MOWER 403-304-1496

For more information, please contact Carl Lynn P.Ag. of Bioriginal at:

DAVE KOEHN

403-546-0060 LINDEN, ALBERTA CANADA

Flexible contracting options available as well.

Available at:

306-229-9976 (cell) 306-975-9295 (office) crops@bioriginal.com

We know that farming is enough of a gamble so if you want to sell it fast place your ad in the Alberta Farmer Express classifieds. It’s a Sure Thing. Call our toll-free number today. We have friendly staff ready to help.

1-888-413-3325.

CHS DynAgra Beiseker, AB

SEED/FEED MISCELLANEOUS Feed Grain

(403) 947-3767

BUYING ALL TYPES OF feed grain. Also have market for light offgrade or heated, picked up on the farm. Eisses Grain Marketing 1-888-882-7803, (403)350-8777 Lacombe.

www.dseriescanola.ca

Place your ad today by call

1-888-413-3325

AGRICULTURAL TOURS Kenya/Tanzania ~ Jan 2014 India ~ Feb 2014 Chile/Argentina/Brazil ~ Feb 2014 Vietnam/Cambodia/Thailand ~ Mar 2014 China ~ March 2014 Ireland & Scotland ~ June 2014 Ukraine ~ June 2014 Australia/New Zealand ~ 2015 *Portion of tours may be Tax Deductible

Select Holidays

1-800-661-4326

www.selectholidays.com

Medicine Hat Coop Ltd. Medicine Hat, AB

(403) 528-6609 www.dseriescanola.ca

Buy and Sell

anything you need through the

1-888-413-3325

Hit our readers where it counts… in the classifieds.

Place your ad in the Alberta Farmer Express classifed section. 1-888-413-3325.

*Portion of to

Available at:

W. Buis Holdings Limited Foremost, AB

(403) 867-2436 www.dseriescanola.ca

OVER MORE SELECTION, MORE OFTEN, MORE DEALS. 43,000 PIECES OF AG EQUIPMENT!

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find exactly what you’re looking for at

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thousands housands of fully searchable ag product and service listings! for more information on the Farmer’s Product Guide please visit www.farmersproductguide.com or call Terry at 204-981-3730

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Watch your profits grow!

Advertise with AFe Classifieds

New 30.5L-32 16 ply, $2,195; 20.8-38 12 ply $795; 18.4-38 12 ply; $789; 24.5-32 14 ply, $1,749; 14.9-24 12 ply, $486; 16.9-28 12 ply $558, 18.4-26 10 ply, $890. Factory direct. More sizes available new and used. 1-800-667-4515. www.combineworld.com

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