photo: istock

CFIA beefs up food safety rules and sets minimum traceability standards

Food companies and farms selling products in other provinces or internationally will need detailed preventive control plans

Traceability will gain a more prominent place on the menu, and food companies will be required to develop preventive control plans under a new regulatory plan proposed by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. The proposals, which follow the passage of the Safe Food for Canadians Act last fall, still have to be put into the

Fencing that once marked pasture land now butts up against the shore of East Shoal Lake.  Photos: Shannon VanRaes

Milking the benefits of canola meal

The Chinese have 7.2 million reasons to switch their dairy cows to canola meal from other protein rations. That’s how many more litres of milk their 12 million cows would produce every day based on a year-long joint Sino-Canadian study conducted by Chinese academics, in co-operation with China’s five largest dairy companies. “Canola meal has


Grain Market Report

The path of least resistance for canola futures on the ICE Futures Canada trading platform remained to the downside during the week ended June 14. Declines were influenced by the perception that canola seeding was now complete and that the crop was off to a generally good start, development-wise. Downward price action was augmented by

Please, let’s not win again

Traceability is a fact of life for almost every other commodity that consumers buy; yet somehow we have not embraced traceability’s potential in the world of food. I cannot buy an iPhone that does not have complete traceability back to its basic components; yet what we put into our bodies is rarely traceable to source.


GRAINS-Corn ends higher, led by new-crop contracts on US weather

* Forecast for hot weather lifts new-crop corn * Gains in nearby corn capped by farmer selling * Soybeans mixed as long July/short November spread unwinds * Wheat firm on rain delays but world supplies cap gains (Recasts, adds closing prices, analyst comments) By Julie Ingwersen CHICAGO, June 18 (Reuters) - U.S. corn futures rose




Wheat breeder Stephen Fox has left Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to work on canola for DL Seeds. Changing jobs means Fox won’t have to move with his family after AAFC closes its Winnipeg Cereal Research Centre.  photo: allan dawson

Winnipeg-based Ag Canada wheat breeder goes private

Stephen Fox, an Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada researcher and developer of such popular hard red spring wheat varieties as Kane and AC Unity, is leaving the federal government to work in the private sector. Fox will join DL Seeds next month, as a canola breeder at its Winnipeg facility. “It will be an exciting change


GRAINS-Corn falls most in a month as USDA forecasts record output

* USDA estimates 2013/14 corn crop at record 14 billion bushels * U.S. winter wheat production lifted on better yields * Wheat futures plunge 2 percent, soybeans narrowly lower (Updates U.S. market activity to close) By Michael Hirtzer CHICAGO, June 12 (Reuters) - U.S. corn futures fell 2.5 percent for their largest decline in a

McMillan: USDA area estimates surprise trade

CNSC / The U.S. Department of Agriculture surprised some analysts Wednesday by leaving seeded area estimates unchanged for all U.S. crops. Before the report, a poll of grain analysts by Reuters found expectations were for corn acres to drop 1.5 million acres and soybean acres to rise 700,000 due to seeding difficulties this spring. Over