Grain latest Port of Churchill shipment

Prairie grain will soon ship out of the Port of Churchill for the first time in at least five years.

Starting Friday, grain will be moved to the northern Manitoba port from The Pas, via the Hudson Bay Railway. Few details were provided Wednesday.

A global agricultural company, based in Canada, will send its grain to international markets via the deep-water port. The first ship should leave Churchill at the end of August or beginning of September, said Chris Avery, president of Arctic Gateway Group, the port’s owner.

Arctic Gateway Group is talking with other companies also looking to ship grain, Avery added.

Uncertainty bakes costs into CUSMA chain

Despite all the melodramatic hype and handwringing leading up to it, the July 1 timeline for renewing the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement on trade passed without a U.S. commitment to extend its 2036 sunset.

The sun still rose the next day. Trucks and trains are still crossing the border carrying Canadian commodities (albeit not on that new bridge named after a famous hockey player). Grocery stores still carry imported fruits and vegetables from the south, and Canadians in several provinces still can’t buy American liquor.

Nothing changed, except everything.

We must now accept the certainty of continued uncertainty as Canada, along with the rest of the world, considers how to deal with the increasingly erratic leadership at the helm of the world’s largest economy.

Big decisions put many farmers in same boat

There’s a lot of sweating, swatting, squinting — and quite possibly a little swearing — in Manitoba farmyards and fields this summer, as farmers navigate what’s turned into a hellish growing season.

Anyone required to work outdoors in the heat and humidity must also suffer through the relentless swarms of voracious mosquitoes and flies brought on by the recent wet weather. The biting insect populations are unlike anything we’ve seen in recent years and they’re making outside life miserable for humans and livestock alike.

It adds another layer to the frustration in a season when it seems nothing is going well. With each twist and turn, the “so now what?” questions keep piling up.

Just getting around the farm or to town for supplies is a chore with roads and bridges washed out in some areas. And the weather alerts just keep coming — warnings of tornadoes, severe thunderstorms and more heavy rain.

Farmers just one link in long supply chain

Farmers are hardly front and centre in newly released federal and provincial reports analyzing why food has become less affordable for many Canadians.

The word “farmers” doesn’t even appear in the Manitoba government’s Grocery Price Strategy report until Page 7.

That’s a good thing, because it signals a new level of awareness in how we collectively view the food system. The focus is shifting from front-line farmers to the largely invisible and complicated supply chain connecting field to table.

It might even change how farmers see themselves.

Significance of soil, water management

The day six inches of rain fell one early July afternoon is etched in my memories of growing up on a southern Manitoba grain farm in the mid-1960s.

Awaiting next stage in biofuels balancing act

There was a lot of mixed messaging over the role agriculture plays in climate change mitigation during the Justin Trudeau era, when the federal government was heavily focused on making the Canadian economy less dependent on carbon-based fuels.

“On the one hand, the federal government, for the last 10 years anyway, has certainly seen our crops as traditional food commodities and has treated their emissions as climate threats,” Grain Growers of Canada executive director Bruce Burrows told a recent webinar discussing Canada’s Clean Fuel Regulation (CFR).

“Yet on the other hand, under CFR, we’re celebrating these exact same crops when they’re turned into fuel, and so … it’s not food or fuel, it’s both.”

The identity crisis was further complicated by Canada’s increasingly testy relationship with its next-door neighbour and largest trading partner.

Mushroom producers face ‘worrying’ duties

Prices may mushroom for American fungi lovers — and the company behind a Manitoba grower is contesting new duties disrupting the industry.

Loveday Mushroom Farms ships roughly 10 million pounds of mushrooms annually from its Oakbank plant to the United States. It accounts for one-fifth of the mushrooms parent company South Mill Champs grows in Canada and sells south of the border.

“We’ve got a good customer base in the U.S. and Canada,” said Lewis Macleod, South Mill Champs chief executive.

But the American base will likely be hit with higher mushroom prices: South Mill Champs plans to pass a new duty to customers, upping the cost of its portabellas and shiitakes.

Balancing act of farm risk-management programs

It’s a long-standing and generally accepted principle of Canadian agricultural policy that farmers need taxpayers’ help countering the unpredictable and wildly fluctuating risks of their operating environment.

Farmers have some measure of control over production choices. Their management can increase yields and reduce reliance on expensive production aids such as fertilizer or pesticides. They can also build an allowance for the unexpected into their game plan, such as seeking off-farm income.

But that can only go so far.

Farmers can’t plan for weather, climate, twists and turns in crop prices, the effect of external forces such as U.S. President Donald Trump’s tantrums or becoming collateral damage in Canadian diplomatic spats with China.

Fertilizer, diesel costs beset farmers

Soybeans are on Jason Rempel’s radar.

The Manitoba farmer has dodged rising nitrogen fertilizer prices — he pre-bought last fall — but if costs continue to climb, he’ll be seeking more soybeans for 2027.

The crop doesn’t require much nitrogen fertilizer, unlike the wheat and corn Rempel is currently spreading across his land near Landmark.

Nitrogen fertilizer prices have jumped 30 to 40 per cent in Western Canada since the United States and Israel attacked Iran earlier this year, according to Farm Credit Canada. Around one-third of global seaborne fertilizer ships through the now-blockaded Strait of Hormuz.

Farm giant’s debt woes everyone’s problem

Rumours had been circulating the virtual coffee shops for months, so news this spring that Saskatchewan-based Monette Farms had sought protection from its creditors wasn’t a shock.

The mega-farm operated by brothers Darryl and Russell Monette obtained protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act. With an extension granted this month, it now has access to $90 million to continue to operate and come up with a plan before June 19 for how it will service its debts and stem operational losses in an incredibly challenging environment.

Monette embarked on a massive expansion over the past decade to become what court affidavits describe as “one of the largest private farms in the world” — owning and leasing more than 400,000 acres of farmland and employing about 425 workers.

A labyrinth of 17 related companies and three limited partnerships is spread over four western provinces and several U.S. states. It’s farming activities focus on grain, produce, cattle, seed processing, vegetables and even a winery.

Think Shift appoints new chief executive on ‘AI plus AI’ approach

Rejecting return-to-office mandates, using artificial intelligence and working with more clients in the United States are top priorities for the new leader of a Winnipeg marketing agency that specializes in agriculture.

Think Shift Inc., appointed Charlie Fiordalis as its chief executive officer last month. He replaced Robert Thorston, who served as CEO for seven years before stepping down and joining the company’s finance team.

A marketing veteran who has spent most of his career working in and around New York City, Fiordalis was most recently the head of growth at PMG, a company that works with iconic brands such as Apple, Nike, and Sephora.

The Darien, Conn., resident says he was drawn to Think Shift because the company is “big enough to matter (and) small enough to change.”

Mustard farmers face cross-pollination risk

Genetically modified crops may have gained widespread adoption among farmers since their introduction 30 years ago, but they remain a polarizing force within the farming community.

Because GM technology still struggles to achieve full market acceptance, many farmers reap the benefits at the expense of a few others who lose relatively small but important markets.

For example, nearly 100 per cent of the commercial canola produced in Canada comes from varieties that are herbicide-tolerant, which is most often a result of GMO traits.

Their widespread use makes it impossible for organic farmers to grow canola that is certifiably free of GM contamination, thanks to Prairie winds that move pollen easily from one field to another.

No one-size-fits-all answers on farm

We all complain about sticker price shock at the grocery store, but when it comes to inflation, farmers have been eating at least some of it on our behalf.

Even before the Middle East firestorm broke out Feb. 28, farming was becoming disproportionately expensive.

Manitoba Agriculture extension economist Darren Bond told a webinar this week that compared to five years ago, farmers’ overall costs of production have risen around 50 per cent — well above the general inflation rate of around 20 per cent. Whether buying new equipment, repairing what they have or acquiring more land, they are often faced with double-digit increases annually.

Can they rent their way out of the bind? A farmer hoping to avoid paying a 46 per cent price increase in the cost of a new sprayer will pay 72 per cent more for a rental than they did in 2020.