Free COVID-19 course for foreign workers, employers

Aim is to acquaint farmworkers with best practices to protect themselves

Glacier FarmMedia – An online course to help producers and international farmworkers protect themselves from COVID-19 is being launched. The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS) is offering the free guide in English, French and Spanish. Participants will learn methods of preventing the spread of COVID-19, which has caused deaths and illnesses on Canadian farms

Living in the shadow of COVID for so long, restaurants offer the perfect escape for when Canadians feel safer to go out again.

Comment: Incentivizing the cautious

Getting customers back into restaurants will be no small challenge in the wake of a pandemic

As we inch towards a more normalized economy, the focus will now be on how we can make people feel more comfortable about going out and about again. Our economy needs it, our foodservice industry desperately needs it, but it is not going to be easy. In a recent survey, conducted in mid-May by the


Flush farmers have a reputation for reinvesting in their operations, which has a positive impact on the economy. (Luca Piccini Basile/iStock/Getty Images)

StatsCan shows 2020 farm income up significantly

Farm cash receipts were up more than expenses

Canadian farm income, no matter how it’s measured, was up a lot in 2020, data released Wednesday by Statistics Canada show. Canadian net farm income of $18.1 billion is up $4.8 billion from 2019 — a 36.5 per cent increase. Another measure — realized net farm income (RNFI) — saw farmers take in $9.9 billion,

Foodgrains Bank disappointed yet hopeful after 2021 budget release

Foodgrains Bank disappointed yet hopeful after 2021 budget release

Canada is doing less than its fair share towards global aid and development, experts say

The Canadian government’s commitments to humanitarian assistance is a “promising start” but not what was hoped for or needed, says the Canadian Foodgrains Bank. “The federal government must make stable, adequate funding available for long-term development, to help lift the world’s poorest people out of poverty,” said Paul Hagerman, the Foodgrains Bank’s director of public policy in a news release


apples

Early-pandemic calls to localize supply chains unfounded

With a year's worth of data, three agriculture economists revisit early-pandemic predictions on the food supply chain

With a year's worth of data, three agriculture economists revisit early-pandemic predictions on the food supply chain

A year of data shows early-pandemic calls for radical changes to food systems and risk management programs were unfounded, say some economists. Particularly in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, food supply chains struggled to adapt to changing consumption patterns and processors shut down due to virus outbreaks. “Into that void of uncertainty came

Federal Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau and Winnipeg South MP Terry Duguid speak with a panel of Manitoba women in agriculture which was broadcasted live on Facebook on April 27.

Federal ag minister talks childcare with Manitoba farm women

The Liberal government pledged to fund Canada-wide childcare as part of its 2021 budget

The Liberal government pledged to fund Canada-wide childcare as part of its 2021 budget

Farm families need access to flexible childcare to allow women farmers to better balance their lives, the federal ag minister told media and a panel of Manitoba women in agriculture. “If we want Canadian agriculture to be more economically and environmentally sustainable, we must break down the barriers for hard-working women in the sector,” said


(CervusEquipment.com)

Cervus expects chip shortages may continue into fall

Deere dealer chain books increased Q1 profit

The semiconductor chip shortage plaguing automotive and equipment manufacturers may last into the second and even third quarters of the year, farm equipment retailer Cervus Group says. Calgary-based Cervus — which operates 64 dealerships in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, including 38 devoted mainly to Deere farm equipment — expects increased demand to run up

Provincial childcare report offers few fixes for farm families

Provincial childcare report offers few fixes for farm families

Funding channels for the extended-hours care farm families need are already in place but need more dollars

A recent provincial report which recommends the province fix Manitoba’s childcare system through ‘market stewardship’ is just more of what got us into this mess, says one childcare expert. “In a way it’s just a new rhetorical package for an old reality,” said Susan Prentice, a childcare researcher from the University of Manitoba. The report’s


(Sollio Co-operative Group video screengrab via YouTube)

Workers call strike at Olymel hog plant in Quebec

Producers urged to prioritize heavier hogs when shipping

Talks toward a new contract for unionized employees at meat packer Olymel’s hog slaughter and processing plant in Quebec’s Beauce region have ended in a strike. The Syndicat des travailleurs d’Olymel Vallee-Jonction-CSN, which represents over 1,000 staff at Vallee-Jonction, about 60 km southeast of Quebec City, called an “indefinite” strike effective Wednesday morning, the union

Mary MacLean is the founder of Happy Dance Hummus, based in Winnipeg.

Small processors say Food Development Centre cuts troubling

Access, cost may have already been an issue, say some sources

Mary MacLean can’t imagine starting Happy Dance Hummus without help from staff at the Food Development Centre. “Basically everything I didn’t know I would turn to them to find out,” MacLean told the Co-operator. When she began her business, about five years ago, she took her homemade hummus to FDC in Portage for analysis. When