Breakfast Never Needs To Be Boring

ith the sun up earlier each morning now, many of us are getting earlier starts to the day. Mornings should always include eating breakfast, of course, yet many of us skip it. I’ve seen reports that say about 40 per cent skip breakfast, often with the notion that it will help with weight loss. (The

Be Good To Your Heart

Your beating heart is a fist-sized pumping system with four valves and four chambers. Various blood vessels carry blood to and from the heart. It circulates blood to every cell in your body as it pumps an average of 100,000 times per day. The pumping action carries oxygen and nutrients that we need to stay


“To Operate As Needed” Is Not What’s Needed

Farm groups, commodity organizations and most ag checkoffs have spent 25 years and billions of dollars refining and repeating their modern message: American agriculture is a business and farmers and ranchers are business people. In the process, cowboys became beef producers and hog farmers became pork producers and a half-million or more of each became

Letters – for Apr. 28, 2011

It is alarming that in this election no one is talking about food sovereignty and security. It should be right up there beside health care because access to affordable, safe, nutritious food can save many health care dollars. According to my cowboy logic, if you eat steak you have a stake in it. The $231


Phytosanitary Grain Rules Need Work

The international grain trade needs better phytosanitary rules and tolerances for low-level presence of genetically modified (GM) crops, says Dennis Stephens, a consultant contracted to co-ordinate the Canada Grains Council. “Zero thresholds are no longer obtainable,” Stephens told the council’s 42nd annual meeting in Winnipeg earlier this month. “We’ve reached a stage where we have

CAPI Report Seeks New Direction For Food Policy

Traceability systems could be the catalyst to get Canadian agriculture participants taking a systems approach that could improve quality, efficiency, competitiveness and profits, David McInnes, president and chief executive officer of the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute says. McInnes reviewed a report the institute released in February that calls for radical reforms of Canadian agriculture policies


Farm Debate Mostly A Rerun Of Earlier Shows

Other than the occasional elbow in the direction of Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz, the two-hour debate among the main political parties on agriculture policy April 11 featured a lot of the same old taunts and promises. Liberal Wayne Easter, Bloc Andre Bellevance and New Democrat Pat Martin, whose downtown Winnipeg riding includes the headquarters of

In Brief… – for Apr. 21, 2011

Food safety chair:Is our food safe to eat? A new Chair in Food Safety the first of its kind in Canada puts McGill University at the head of the table in seeking answers to that question. The chair will undertake collaborative research, offer undergraduate and graduate teaching programs, and provide the independent, third-party expertise on


Cellulosic Ethanol Plant Coming?

The straw Red River Valley farmers burn in their fields could soon be burning in their half-ton engines instead. An official with Shell Canada confirmed the fossil fuel oil company is looking across Western Canada, including Manitoba, for a site to build a cellulosic ethanol plant with its partner Iogen Corporation. “Shell has committed to

Lots Of Heat, Not Much Light

There was a little heat but not much light from the five candidates who squared off in the two-hour debate on agricultural issues hosted by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture April 11. Despite his recent remarks in Minnedosa about letting farmers decide the future of the Canadian Wheat Board, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz reiterated the