MASC has announced its new offerings for 2020, including a contract price option for canola and peas, wildlife damage coverage for grazed forages and a new crop covered under organic insurance.

What’s new in crop insurance for 2020?

MASC offerings this year will include better price options for high-value crops and expanded programming for novel crops, organics, feed crops and strawberries

MASC has come out with its list of program changes for 2020, and some sectors may have reason to celebrate. The list of changes, presented at Ag Days by Manitoba Agriculture and Resource Development Minister Blaine Pedersen, includes a higher price option for high-value crops, expanded portfolios for organic and novel crop insurance and more



A worker pushes a cart of marijuana plants at the Canopy Growth facility at Smiths Falls, Ont. on Jan. 4, 2018. (File photo: Reuters/Chris Wattie)

Bargain hunters fire up rally in cannabis stocks

New York | Reuters — Some cannabis stocks are seeing their prices surge as investors hunt for winners in the ashes of an industry shakeout that hammered share prices last year. Shares of Tilray Inc. and Canopy Growth Corp. have climbed more than 20 per cent since the start of the year, while Cronos Group

blaine pedersen

Crop insurance: What’s new in 2020?

The organic sector, farmers with extended grazing and high-value crop growers can all expect more insurance options this year

Crop insurance coverage is poised for another increase in 2020, according to Manitoba Agricultural Services Corp. (MASC). AgriInsurance coverage will hit $3 billion this year, with similar premiums to 2019. Why it matters: Better production knowledge has yields, and coverage, trending up, while the organic sector and producers with extended grazing will get more safety


Many Manitoba farmers felt the pain of a hard season.

Manitoba farmers challenged by 2019 crop

The worst part was the ‘harvest from hell’, which for some still isn’t over

Too dry, too wet and then it snowed. Lots. That sums up Manitoba’s 2019 growing season, culminating with the “harvest from hell,” which for some farmers won’t end until spring. “I have often said it’s not a good sign when you’re harvesting and they’re playing Christmas carols on the radio,” Minto farmer and Keystone Agricultural

Manitoba’s Liquor, Gaming and Cannabis Authority (LGCA) has been running billboards such as this one in Winnipeg to educate the public ahead of edibles’ entry to the recreational market. (Dave Bedard photo)

Cannabis patients boost Aurora edible sales

Toronto | Reuters — Aurora Cannabis this week became the first major Canadian company to sell edibles and vapes for medical use, a small base that nevertheless helps shore up margins and paves the way for sales in the much larger European medical market. Medical marijuana has been legal in Canada since 2001, and recreational


(Eyfoto/iStock/Getty Images)

U.S. House passes CUSMA

Washington | Reuters — The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday backed a new trade agreement with neighbouring Mexico and Canada in a 385-41 bipartisan vote, sending the NAFTA replacement measure to the Senate for consideration early in 2020. Democrats, who control the House, approved the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (CUSMA) more than a year after

File photo of Bloc Quebecois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet in Montreal on Oct. 22, 2019. (Photo: Reuters/Andrej Ivanov)

Opposition MPs could delay CUSMA deal’s ratification

Ottawa | Reuters — Canada’s two main opposition parties on Wednesday suggested they could move to delay ratification of a new continental trade pact, accusing the Liberal government of botching revisions to the treaty. Such a move would embarrass Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who has vowed that Parliament will quickly approve the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (CUSMA).