The Standing committee on Agriculture, Environment, Energy and Forestry will hear several presentations at their next meeting planned for the March 25. The session will get under way at 10 a.m. in the Pope Room of the Coles Building. Representatives of Nature’s Crops International, the PEI Harness Racing Industry Association, the National Farmers Union and the PEI Federation of Agriculture will be making presentations. The committee is chaired by Alan McIsaac and the other members are Jim Bagnall, Michael Currie, Valerie Docherty, Robert Henderson, Charles McGeoghegan, Robert Vessey and Buck Watts   ...

Soybeans There are four tangible options available to soybean growers: Forward Contract, IP Contract, Soybean Pool, and direct purchase. The Grain Elevator Corporation (GEC) has quoted a forward price for GMO beans and purchases up to 50 % on this basis. The other 50%, a grower may elect to place in a pool at harvest. Alternatively, the GEC will purchase a quantity of beans out right for cash to service the local livestock industry or for local export. At the time of writing, soybeans are worth in the area of net $315 per metric tonne for delivery next fall. A fourth ...

As they looked around the latest equipment at the International Potato Technology Expo, some growers must have been wondering whether they would soon find themselves with little need of the technology they have. The processing sector, which accounts for approximately 60 per cent of Island production, has become stagnant in the wake of declining french fry sales, especially in the restaurant trade. Both Cavendish Farms and McCain Food cut back acreage approximately 15 per cent last year and little has changed since then. Just how tough it will be this year is now starting to come into focus. Just days before the ...

The P.E.I. Institute of Agrologists is putting together a conference on “championing agriculture” with funding help from the Premier’s Innovative Speaking Series. The institute’s proposal was one of five approved in the first round of funding for the series. Institute spokesman Brian Beaton said they are hoping to bring in an internationally renowned speaker for the event—tentatively planned for November. The Premier’s Innovation Speaker Series, an initiative of the Island Prosperity Strategy, is designed to advance knowledge and activities in the priority sectors of bioscience, including agriculture and fisheries, aerospace, information technology and renewable energy. “Our goal is to bring world-class experts ...

Raising the production bar will be the theme of the annual Atlantic cranberry management course. This year’s session is slated for March 10-12 at the Westin Nova Scotia Hotel in Halifax. Last year’s session was held in Charlottetown. Registration begins Wednesday at 5 p.m. and there will be a wine and cheese reception from 7-9 p.m. The session begins in earnest Thursday morning with a welcome from Blake Johnston, president, Nova Scotia Cranberry Growers Association and a workshop session on Engineering and Bed Design (Building beds, Water Control and Drainage). ...

The province’s beleaguered hog industry has been dealt yet another blow. Larsen Packers Ltd has announced it will stop processing fresh hogs March 26. The general manager of the P.E.I. Hog Board said about half of the 22 hog producers left in the province are currently shipping to the plant in Berwick, Nova Scotia. “In terms of volume, it varies from week to week,” said Tim Seeber. “It can be as low as 200 animals and as high as 800 or 900.” Seeber explained the other half of Island production (along with production in other Maritime provinces) is under long term contracts to ...

Malpeque MP, Wayne Easter is concerned by a recent Statistics Canada report which has again identified that the farm population continues to decline. The report indicated that the number of cattle farms in Canada has fallen to an 80 year low and that in the face of tighter border controls as well as heavy environmental and economic blows, hog farms and cattle herds have shrunk to their lowest levels in more than a decade. “More livestock producers are abandoning their land because the Minister of Agriculture Gerry Ritz and the Harper Conservatives have failed to provide farmers with the necessary support ...

Donald Anderson, a long-time general manager of the P.E.I. Potato Board and member of the Atlantic Agricultural Hall of Fame, passed away at his home in St Peters March 1. He was 83. Donald Garth Anderson was born on October 10, 1927 in St. Peter's on a family farm first settled by his great grandfather some 200 years ago. Don received his early education at St. Peter's Elementary, St. Peter's High School, and he attended Prince of Wales College in Charlottetown for two years. He continued his education for one year at the Nova Scotia Agricultural College in Truro and ...

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