It would be giving the animal a gene, which nature made a mistake by not giving them.” If there is one sentence that captures why the world’s first GMO pig never made it to market, it would be this comment from one of the lead researchers on the University of Guelph project back in 2001.
Short-sighted solution to the wrong problem
An independent view
The Co-operator began an ambitious project a few months ago, setting out to tell the history behind the Canadian Grain Commission as it celebrates 100 years of service this month. One of the things we discovered early into the effort was that there is a lot of history to tell — the story of how
Lies, damned lies… and statistics
Last week began with the latest Canadian farm income outlook delivered by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, a report that by most accounts was pretty bullish on farm income projections for the next 10 years or so. In fact, it was the kind of report that is likely to have the farming community squirming for a
Economics versus culture
Dermot Hayes, a respected livestock economist from Iowa State University, is admittedly flummoxed over the question of whether it will be grain producers or the livestock sector benefiting from the growing demand for protein in emerging economies. Hayes was in town last week delivering the annual Kraft Lecture, a memorial to the late University of
The economics of animal welfare
Back in the early 1990s, when University of Manitoba animal scientist Laurie Connor first oversaw local research into hoop-housing systems for hogs, animal welfare wasn’t really even on the public radar. The key questions of the day were whether keeping pigs outdoors through a Prairie winter compromised production efficiency. Connor told a seminar last week
From Ethiopia: Aid agencies focus on helping others to help themselves
It was a gift with strings attached, but that was just fine with Bekelech Basa. The single mother of six children from this small community about five hours southwest of Addis Ababa was given a goat on the condition that she give up its first-born kid. It’s just one example of how aid is changing.
Sights, sounds and smells in a far-off land
The sun was just peeking above the horizon as the Boeing 777 banked south just over Cairo, Egypt and headed for Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital that serves as the hub for all of Africa. We’d been travelling ahead in time, losing a night as we left Washington, D.C. at around 11 a.m. on Saturday,
Without January rains, one of two heifers will be sold
Co-operator editor Laura Rance is travelling on a media food study tour with the Canadian Foodgrains Bank. Updates are being posted on the Co-operator website at www.manitobacooperator.ca. The highway southwest of Addis Ababa to Wolayto-Soddo is wide and smooth, but there is no such thing in Ethiopia as setting the cruise control and just cruising,
In Ethiopia: Pivotal to survival, donkeys get no respect
If author Anna Sewell were alive today, chances are she’d be writing a follow to her best-selling novel Black Beauty about the plight of Addis and Ababa — donkeys in Ethiopia. Her 1877 story about a horse raised awareness of the inhumane treatment of horses in England and sold 50 million copies worldwide. It is
In Ethiopia: Agricultural growth a multifaceted challenge
With nearly 50 per cent of Ethiopia’s GDP rooted in agriculture, it goes without saying that growing the industry is its best short-term hope of boosting the economy. After all, between 80 and 90 per cent of Ethiopians farm for a living. It has the highest per capita density of cattle in Africa and is