A couple years ago I was out at the farm for a few days and my brother asked me to bid on something in an online auction sale for him. He had other commitments so he told me the lot number, what he was willing to pay, and wished me luck. I was going to
Editor’s Take: Unwiring the world
Editor’s Take: Living through history
Historic times are rarely comfortable times. Ask your ancestors who, in the first half of the last century alone lived through two world wars, one economic collapse, and a mega-drought. Or for that matter the millennials of today, who have so far survived one global financial crisis and a pandemic, with another economic crisis on
Editor’s Take: The last mile
Every year around the world, billions of dollars, euros, yen and yuan are spent on agriculture research. In Canada alone, public funding of “research in support of agriculture,” to quote the federal government, topped $557 million in the 2016-17 fiscal year. That figure may wax and wane with the budgetary vagaries of government, but it’s
Editor’s Take: A stain on the Canada brand
A series of hard-hitting articles on migrant farm workers in Canada has shone a light on some realities that will make many Canadians uncomfortable. The Globe and Mail series was undoubtedly a shock to many readers unaware migrant farm workers were even ‘a thing’ in Canada. It details conditions that will leave a pretty clear
Editor’s Take: Where’s the beef?
When did Manitoba become a laggard? There was a time when the Keystone province embraced bold visions, naysayers be damned. Duff Roblin’s response to the 1950 flood is an excellent example of this lost glory. Roblin, a Progressive Conservative, assumed the role of premier in the late spring of 1958, and before long he was
Editor’s Take: Send in the clowns
The finding of ‘double criminality’ by B.C. Supreme Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes in the Huawei case last week dashed any hopes of a quick and orderly wrap-up to Canada’s ongoing diplomatic war with China. Justice Holmes ruled that the crimes Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou is charged with in the U.S. are also crimes in
Editor’s Take: China is our greatest ‘frenemy’
In recent years it has become increasingly apparent that China makes its own rules when it comes to trade. Its 2002 membership in the World Trade Organization is an excellent example. The rest of the world agreed to give China open access to markets, ostensibly in exchange for similar access to China’s. One can hardly
Editor’s Take: Writing a new story for Canada’s grain sector
Ask any writer and they’ll tell you the hardest thing is writing a story without an antagonist. Heroes are a dime a dozen, but it’s the villains who are usually more interesting characters, providing the conflict that drives the plot along and captures the interest of the reader. As our Allan Dawson reports in our
Editorial: Agriculture slips through the safety net
Canadian agriculture is very proud of its prominence in the national economy, and rightly so. As StatsCan noted in a 2019 report, agriculture and food contributed $49 billion to the nation’s GDP in 2015, or 2.6 per cent of total GDP. That’s been a target of growth too, as various projection and government plans have
Editor’s Take: Stress cracks but no fractures
Now is when the systemic shortfalls are beginning to show. It’s only when a complex system is put under stress that underlying and underappreciated issues start to appear. Think of the 2008 global financial crisis as an example. Prior to it being revealed as the precarious house of cards that it was, housing in the
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