Cattle Country 25 Years

to last 25 years is very satisfying and hopefully it will be around for many years to come,” she says, although she is quick to give credit to the forward-thinking board of directors and staff that were so supportive of the idea at the beginning. They included Blair Olafson, who was President when Cattle Country was launched, and the late Ken Malenko who was a director and enthusiastic volunteer proofreader/fact checker for early issues.

Developing a vision

Wanda McFayden was the newly hired General Manager of MCPA when Cattle Country launched and well remembers the conversations around the Board table about developing a direction and vision for the newspaper.

“The biggest impetus was the fact that it needed to be a publication specifically for beef producers and that belonged to the producers,” she says. “It allowed us as an organization to hone in on provincial, national and international issues that impacted producers on a daily basis, and talk about beef cattle research, so they got a broader knowledge of the industry and made them aware of what was going on outside their own operation and in the supply chain. It was an important way for producers to feel they had ownership of the organization and keep them informed.”

A community newspaper for Manitoba’s beef community

But what makes Cattle Country unique is the fact that it isn’t just a communication vehicle, or a fact sheet of information about issues; it’s a community newspaper for Manitoba’s beef community. It encapsulates the diversity and versatility of the industry by showcasing progressive producers and their practices, sharing new and exciting ways to prepare beef recipes and being a strong advocate for an industry that leads the way in areas of sustainability and stewardship. These are guiding principles that have not changed in 25 years.

In every issue there is something for everyone and there’s no effort needed to find it. You don’t have to log in to your device, stare at a screen or wade through an ever-growing mountain of emails or social media posts to find that article you had meant to read when it first popped up but just didn’t have time to. You can grab Cattle Country off the coffee table, put your feet up with a cup of coffee and pick up the story where you left off before you had to go deliver a calf or move bales around.

“There’s always been a little bit of everything in Cattle Country,” says Maureen Cousins, MBP’s Policy Analyst. “Somebody is going to find something that is of value to them, whether it’s a production tip, an article on a hot-button topic like ag Crown lands, predation, or perhaps a recipe. There may be something that encourages producers to pick up the phone to help advance issues with government, and work towards solutions to help deal with some of the stressors in the sector. It’s got a feel-good piece, an informational piece, an advocacy piece, it’s a lot of different tools wrapped up in one package that gets delivered to producers’ mailboxes.”

A personal touch

As part of the community building process, Emilson believed it was important for producers to have a more personal connection to the directors of their organization, which is why she began the tradition of including profiles of new directors in Cattle Country as they were elected and new staff that came to work for the organization. Emilson would sit down and personally interview the new directors at district meetings, or sometimes at the kitchen table, sharing a meal with their families on their farm.

“I believed it was important that producers got to know not only the director in their area but that directors would get to know each other as well,” she says. “The profiles gave them the opportunity to know the president (if not from their district), the staff and the people involved. The cattle industry is close knit in Manitoba and the idea was to pull together the producers, the organization that was advocating on their behalf, and the business community that was supplying them.”

Emilson is immensely proud that Cattle Country has withstood the test of time. “For something that you start

Issues of the time that were front and centre in many of the first issues included the formation of R-CALF, U.S. border closures, the rollout of the National Identification Program, a bovine tuberculosis outbreak in the Riding Mountain National Park area, and new discussions about the benefits of grazing management and other production practices.

It was also a time when there was no email!

“I would have been delighted to have the email that we have today,” McFayden says. “I was writing up reports and sending out faxes or phoning around to all the auction marts every night for updates, so the paper was a great asset in the sense that we could update producers about what was happening on trade fronts and other areas,” Wanda says. “It was a new tool to help educate our producers; something that they could look to for information that was pertinent and timely. It’s still doing the same job; hitting those important issues and providing more background to the producers out on the landscape.”

Changing with the industry

Martin Unrau, still has every copy of Cattle Country that came out during his time as MCPA president beginning in 2003.

“I was looking at some of those papers the other day and it’s interesting that the issues that we were talking about in 2004 and 2005, like sustainability and making sure our industry flourished are still the things we talk about today,” Unrau says.

Unrau was president during the height of the BSE crisis, and that brought about a tumultuous period where there were constant changes in trade arrangements and markets, and Cattle Country was right there in the thick of it helping producers make sense of it all.

“Most producers at the time weren’t as aware as they are today of the importance of international trade and ensuring the credibility of our product, and I think Cattle Country was, and remains, instrumental in getting those messages across because when our producers understand it, the message gets out to the consumer and we all benefit,” Unrau says

Maureen Cousins also has an archive of Cattle Country papers, and she knows first-hand how oddly, things have changed but also stayed the same over the years. Cousins has worked for the MCPA and MBP on and off since 2004, and has been the Policy Analyst since 2012. She has also done several stints as the organization’s communications coordinator and editor of Cattle Country www.mbbeef.ca

Cousins had a baptism by fire when it came to the issues the then-MCPA was dealing with back in the early 2000s such as BSE and U.S. border closures, bovine TB, flooding, the traceability programs getting off the ground and the introduction of RFID tags, changing environmental regulations, and the launch of the Manitoba Cattle Enhancement Council. No wonder Cattle Country had so many pages back then!

“We had a lot of advertisers, and that is perhaps indicative of the size of the industry then versus now,” Cousins says.

And the information for those pages, the stories, and the advertisement designs and copy were largely going back and forth by fax.

“Website development hadn’t really taken off yet,” Cousins says. “We were doing a publication eight times a year, so there was a lot of faxing going on. When you look at then versus now, we have had a huge leap forward in terms of communication tools that are out there to supplement Cattle Country. There is social media, the website, blogs and podcasts, it’s a whole different realm, but producers still need that core communication tool, which is Cattle Country. It reaches a broad demographic and gives the ability to lay out information in a user-friendly format to diverse audiences including producers and government officials to help advance our advocacy work.”

From its inception, the people behind Cattle Country have worked hard to make sure it isn’t seen as simply a propaganda piece for the beef industry. They have done a good job because it is certainly seen as a strong advocacy tool for the industry, but also as a balanced and trustworthy information source, with well-researched, in-depth stories and editorials that delve into topics the way other mediums – like social media or even general agricultural publications – aren’t able to.

“How do you get producers worked up about an issue? You explain it in detail in the paper, and suddenly a phone is ringing in an MP’s office,” Cousins says. “It’s that grassroots approach which our sector is wellknown for. We know we’re not always going to agree on everything but Cattle Country is one avenue where we can put out views and encourage engagement, especially at a time when people are becoming increasingly disengaged.”

By 2009, it was time for a change and Audrey Kuik was hired to assist with the development of a new communications strategy. With her extensive background in marketing and design, she was the perfect person to help the organization build a new brand identity for itself; one that would establish it as the recognized and exclusive representative and voice for the beef industry in Manitoba.

This was important at a time when the general public was scrutinizing agriculture in ways they never had before; they had questions about where their food was coming from, who was producing it and how. They had expectations about the environmental impact and sustainability of the food they put on their table and the beef industry, with the rise of digital media, found itself battling against disinformation that was all too