Is Global Food Demand Outpacing Supply?

January 2011 started off with lower world stocks and improving commodity prices. The rising prices were largely due to challenging weather anomalies around the world reducing yield and quality. Combining this with an increasing world population, improved living standards and growing demands for livestock products which requires more grain production – and the future for Canada’s agricultural commodities was looking pretty good.

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I grew up on a tobacco farm. My brother grew tobacco, as did my father and grandfather. I have spent literally months of my life replanting, weeding, irrigating, harvesting and moving flue-cured leaf. Accordingly, I have viewed the rise and fall of the Ontario tobacco industry with keen interest and have tried to glean lessons from it that can be used when studying other agricultural commodities.

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(NC)—When it comes to online marketing and advertising, it can often seem like an alphabet soup of acronyms and options for the small business owner, from SEO and SEM, to Facebook and Twitter. With so many online marketing tools and terminology, knowing what will work best at a local level can seem like an overwhelming challenge.

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New Whereabouts™ unique safety device reduces farm risk and improves safety for kids, workers and pets. 

Three innovative rural farm families from Saskatchewan have developed a unique safety device that will improve farmyard safety for their children and other farm families. “We saw a product similar to this device in Europe, however, when we investigated the possibility of importing the product we came across a few roadblocks to do that,” explains Wendy Wecker, one of the partners in Prairie Tech Enterprises Ltd. “We were still really interested in the product, so we decided we could go forward by making a ‘made in Canada solution’.” 

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A go-for-it attitude characterizes the New Zealand farm scene

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Regina, Saskatchewan– A new year is a good time to start a new habit, and Farm Credit Canada (FCC) suggests that regularly listening to a podcast is a good idea for Canadian producers. Canada’s leading provider of agriculture lending products and services now has a series of podcasts, entitled FCC Edge, adding to a variety of other online and in-person learning options for Canadian producers.

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Farmers across the country need to take action to meet the need of consumers who are asking questions about how animals are raised and about how their food is produced.

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The MacDonald-Laurier institute recently published Canadian Agriculture and Food: A Growing Hunger for Change by Larry Martin and Kate Stiefelmeyer. Central to the paper is that while tremendous growth worldwide in the demand for food and non-food agricultural products is on the horizon, Canada is losing ground in a number of areas.

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Willow biomass production research and demonstration in Manitoba. For Roger and Marie Haynes of Neepawa, Manitoba the search for a way to heat their farm and greenhouse so they could grow food year-round led them to a unique greenhouse covering and willow plantings as a renewable crop. Willow can produce a large quantity of biomass in a short period of time, has low input requirements and a positive environmental impact. Willow provides biomass for generating heat and electricity, sequesters carbon and has bioremediation potential.

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Mobile technology offers new options and 'apps' for agriculture.

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Regina, Saskatchewan – Optimism among Canadian agriculture producers and agribusiness owners is at an all-time high, according to the fifth annual Farm Credit Canada (FCC) national Vision panel survey. A full 80% say that their farm or business will be better off in five years – a shift from 76% in 2010. Further evidence of this optimistic attitude is demonstrated in additional survey findings which show:

 

• that more Canadian producers report being better off today than they were five years ago – 77%compared to 67% in 2010;

• that 58% of producers plan to expand or diversify their operations within the next five years; and

• that seven in ten producers would encourage a friend or relative to pursue a career in primary production.

 

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Winnipeg - There’s a new Canadian safety standard for portable augers used on farms.  It could take a couple of years before producers see the results on the market but auger manufacturers are getting set now to work the new standard into their equipment designs.   

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(NC)—Ask most Canadians and they'll tell you that money management stresses them out. They know they're carrying too much debt and too little savings, but they often lack the skills to break their bad financial habits. As a reflection of its ongoing commitment to financial education, Desjardins Group conducted an online survey of 3,000 Canadian adults to evaluate their aptitude in responsible personal financial management. The findings were then used to create the first-ever Canadian index of responsible personal finances. It's an original and comprehensive yardstick that provides a complete assessment of the public's ability to manage their personal finances, covering the two basic dimensions of knowledge and behaviour.

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Researchers show potential for altering grazing management to benefit carbon storage. 

Several research projects under the BC Future Forest Ecosystems Scientific Council (FFESC) are focusing on the adaptation of the forest and range management framework to climate change. “As part of a larger FFESC project, we are looking at possible ways of altering grazing management to increase carbon sequestration and to help ranchers realize the benefits,” says Dr. Lauch Fraser, Professor and Canada Research Chair in Community and Ecosystem Ecology, Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, BC. 

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Purple Daze Lavender Farm is an oasis of calm compared to that of Jason Ryder, a young neighbour who farms just south of Delhi, a few kilometers to the east.

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(EN)—For many people, ringing in the New Year allows the opportunity to wipe the slate clean and start fresh. And while the majority of Canadians will be resolving to lose weight, get more sleep or eat healthier, many personal finance experts are encouraging Canadians to make 2012 the year they get financially fit.

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A growing consciousness about organic and locally grown foods is helping drive some young people to choose farming as a career choice.

A Wisconsin factory worker worried about layoffs became a dairy farmer. An employee at a Minnesota nonprofit found an escape from her cubicle by buying a vegetable farm. A nuclear engineer tired of office bureaucracy decided to get into cattle ranching in Texas.

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When Rodney Voldeng from Naicam, Sask. answers his cellphone, he says he’d like to be part of our discussion, but could I email him so he can respond when he’s not on the combine? Like most of the younger generation, Voldeng is open to sharing his opinion, but prefers communicating by computer.

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New entrants program will relieve financial burden.

If you’re ready to start farming and looking for financial help and business advice, the new FarmNext program may help. FarmNext encourages new farmers to begin farming in Nova Scotia with business planning and coaching, interest rate financial benefits, and on-going financial management advice from specialists of Industry Development and Business Services Branch of the Department of Agriculture.

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Norfolk is not a place where you’d necessarily expect to find a hotbed of innovative entrepreneurship. Not only did a single crop dominate the area but growers, save those on the marketing board, had no hand in selling it.

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"Procedural drift" (PD) is a challenge for many dairy owners/managers, says Ken Bolton, dairy agent with the UW's Center for Dairy Profitability. He defines PD as "employee protocol implementation noncompliance."

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Jack Uldrich believes he is able to capture glimpses of the future. A futurist with the School of Unlearning, Uldrich sees rapidly evolving technology leading farmers to a future where many of their management decisions will be impacted in new and perhaps unexpected ways. At the recent Agricultural Adaptation Council annual meeting, he shared his insights into how he sees farming changing as a result of computing power, tracking and communications technology.

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“Farming has changed already, purely because communication has changed,” says Wray. By engaging the general public and by injecting their opinions into farm businesses strategies, Wray says farmers will continue to improve. In fact, she says it’s unavoidable at this point.

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Research study helps Prairie farmers and communities assess risks and identify adaptation strategies. 

A new project launched in April 2011 at the University of Regina will study how climate change will impact the Prairies, especially the agricultural and Indigenous communities. This five-year project, funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) under the International Research Initiative on Adaptation to Climate Change (IRIACC) is part of a $2.5 million international project on Vulnerability and Adaptation to Climate Extremes in the Americas.

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Tobacco’s demise not only hit farmers in the pocketbook but also threatened the fragile ecosystem of the productive, but highly erodible soil of the Norfolk sand plain.

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