Cory Knutt

Cereals Canada has released its 2021 annual report, providing an overview of how the organization worked to support the Canadian cereals value chain, and made progress on its key objectives, despite industry-wide challenges.

“In the last year, the entire industry came together to support each other,” said Board Chair Todd Hames. “We experienced drought, excess moisture, floods, geopolitical crisis, evolving marketplace concerns, and government regulation, yet we continued to maneuver through these events to help Canadian farmers and the cereals value chain.”

On Thursday, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Marie-Claude Bibeau, announced that the interest-free portion of the Advance Payments Program will increase from $100,000 to $250,000 for the 2022 and 2023 program years. As a result, participating producers will save on average $5,500 in interest costs over the next two years. This change will represent total savings of up to $61 million over two years for approximately 11,000 producers.

Forward hog contract prices have been stable as of late.

Tyler Fulton is director of risk management with Hams Marketing Services.

"We've seen a fair amount of volatility day to day, but they haven't been trending one direction or the other," he said. "Whatever they seem to lose one day, they'll regain the next day and it's coming not just from a volatile pork complex but also the Canadian dollar is highly volatile as well and that has a direct influence on what forward prices are."

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), which represents about 750 CN Rail employees, says signal and communication workers have walked off the job across the country.

Workers were legally on strike as of 11 a.m. local time on Saturday.

The IBEW gave a 72-hour strike notice Wednesday morning.

A spokesman for CN Rail says the company has implemented an "operational contingency plan," noting that operations are continuing "safely and at normal levels."

About 750 Canadian National Railway employees are threatening to strike beginning on Saturday.

The company announced Wednesday that it received a 72-hour strike notice from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

Wages and benefits are two of the main issues.

CN remains optimistic that an agreement can be reached without a labour disruption.

Farm Credit Canada (FCC) has released its second quarter Economic and Financial Market Update.

Kyle Burak is a senior economist with FCC.

Dairy Farmers of Canada (DFC) has made a request to the Canadian Dairy Commission (CDC) for an advance price adjustment in the farmgate price of milk.

The Thanks for Farming Tour and Meridian Manufacturing Inc. have announced a new joint scholarship initiative.

The Meridian Agriculture Scholarship is open to students in grades 11 and 12 in the provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

The scholarship directly connects students with their communities to understand and recognize the importance of agriculture and the role it plays within their communities.

Representatives from the Canola Council of Canada, Cereals Canada, and Pulse Canada met last week in Ottawa with government decision makers about the establishment of a diversification office in the Indo-Pacific region. 

A newly released joint-commissioned report outlines why Canada must take strategic steps to secure its agricultural export growth, diversification and competitiveness in a key export region. 

A key pillar of the report is the creation of a Canadian Indo-Pacific Diversification Office.

With June quickly approaching, farmers will be working with a condensed timeline for spring seeding.

Justine Cornelsen is the Agronomic and Regulatory Services Manager with BrettYoung.