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June Newsletter Pickering

Hello Everyone,

A reminder for our Pickering customers that our next delivery is Saturday, June 23rd, at 7:00 PM.  The location is Dunbarton-Fairport United Church.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Locations/Pickering.html

I have arrangements made with the processor to have some pigs butchered.  If you are interested in a side of pork we will need your order by Tuesday afternoon (June 15th).

Other orders should be placed by June 21st to allow us time to compile the boxes.  

Calving on the farms of the Beef Connections members is about complete.  It is nice this time of year to have the cows and their offspring out on pasture.  The flies and mosquitoes haven’t been much of nuisance so far this season however with all the wet weather we have experienced,  the mosquitoes will be coming soon.

How many of you know the life cycle of a beef animal?  Much and time and expense goes into raising cattle.  We are talking years, not the few weeks it takes to raise a commercial broiler for the chain stores’ meat counters.

A healthy, fit cow ovulates every 21 days and once bred, gestation takes 9 months or approximately 283 days.  Calves are normally born in the spring but they can come any time of the year.  Spring calving is best however, for the cow/calf pairs can take advantage of the lush pastures and the increased milk production for the fast growing calf.  The bull is turned out with the cows about two months after the cows freshen, to start the process over. The calves are weaned from their mothers in the fall whenever the weather or grass supply dictate that it is time to stable the cattle.  The calves are fed the best feed that we were able to harvest during the summer months.  B! y this time the calves are 5-7 months old and weigh half as much as his/her mother. The cow herself now has 2 to 3 months to rest and grow the fetus which, conceived 6 months ago, is in the third trimester.

After weaning, grain is introduced into the calves’ feed ration.  The grain has several purposes: it helps to replace the nutrients that the milk was supplying, it gives the calves energy to help keep warm in the colder weather and lastly, it initiates fat deposition for marbling and finish.  As the yearling grows the grain portion of the diet is increased to keep pace with their dietary needs.  At 16 to 20 months the young cattle beast is ready to be sent to market; most of which will be shipped by the time winter rolls in again.

In the meantime the cow has freshened again resulting in three generations of cattle on the ground at the same time.  The next generation of calves are then weaned and are placed in the pens that the previous years cattle occupied and have just been shipped to market.

From the time of conception until the beef is harvested almost 2 1/2 years has passed and all the expenses, including housing, electricity, vitamins and minerals, cropping and pasture to name a few have been paid. This happens before any return is received from the sale of the cattle.

Need to keep some heifers for herd replacements?  At 15 to 17 months of age a heifer can be exposed to the bull and her first calf is born when she is about 2 years of age. Added on to this another 16 to 20 months before her calf is ready for market. The time elapsed before any return on investment: conception until birth 9 months + 16 months until breeding age + 9 months for gestation + 18 months for growing and fattening of the first calf for a grand total of 52 months or almost 4 1/2 years before any returns are received on this young cow.  It takes several more calves to be produced from this cow before there is any chance of realizing a profit and this makes beef production financ! ially dangerous and difficult.

Many hundreds of dollars have been invested in producing a beef animal and it has been next to impossible to recover the cost of producing beef.  We have been in a situation where we have been getting 197x’s prices for our beef with 20xx’s cost for a number of years when selling into the conventional beef market.  

The local food movement, farmers markets and selling direct to the consumer is definitely  helping the beef farmers in Ontario obtain more of a return on investment and hard work.  Cattle numbers have been dropping and there are now fewer cattle on farms then before the 1930’s!

One last item:  I mentioned this in the last newsletter that the local small butcher shops and abattoirs are being put out of business by onerous upgrade demands by inspectors.  Granted there is always need to repair and replace equipment and sanitation is always high on the agenda of food processing businesses; the problem the small shops are experiencing now is the demands of inspectors are too costly.  It may be OK for big processors that slaughter a 1000 pigs and hour to incur and pay for these upgrades but for a small abattoir that kills 100 a week is hard-pressed to pay the same level of expenses.  A butcher’s career isn’t long enough to get a payback on tha! t large of  investment.  

A survey sent around to the small shops showed the tremendous fear of reprisal if they even question the inspector about his/her demands.  The threat of closure is the first card played if any resistances is shown by the owner.  Another problem brought out by the survey was the fact that rules the inspectors go by can be interrupted many different ways.  Inspectors rotate around the different regions so one month the inspector may deem everything fit but the next month a different inspector may demand changes that could cost thousands of dollars even though nothing has changed at the abattoir. These small shops and abattoirs can not continue on in this business climate and many ha! ve thrown in the towel; 15 years ago there were over 900 small shops and abattoirs and today there are only around 130!  If you wish to continue buying local meat direct from local farms then the time to act is now. How do we act?  Contact your local MP/MPP.  They will tell you the government has money available to help with these upgrades.  The question you ask then is, “How come only the big corporate plants have been getting these grants worth millions?”

That is all for now.  Have a great summer!

Regards,
Robert

 

June Newsletter Toronto

Hi everyone,

 I started this newsletter (Hi everyone,         ) which is as far along as I proceeded two weekends ago.  I most not manage my time very well for I am up against it and just have to publish this letter today. 

Our fieldwork was well ahead schedule this spring.  We had most of our crops planted in April, which in our area has happened before but only once in a farmer’s career.  According to farmers’ folklore, the last time this phenomenon occurred was in the mid 40’s.  Well before my time.

June 5th is our next delivery date.  Already, there have been a large number of orders submitted.  Almost half of these orders are from new customers!  This is just amazing to witness and be part of an organization that is experiencing such an increase in participation from our urban friends and neighbours. Beef Connections is delighted in knowing that what we produce on our farms is so well received.

There is some information about farming that I have compiled and posted on the Beef Connections>Past Newsletters from the Guelph newsletter (last month) that might be of interest.

Moving on:

Important Beef Connections Information

Saturday June 5th is our next delivery date.  You can check delivery times and locations here. http://www.beefconnections.ca/Locations/Locations_&_Times.html

As I write this newsletter we have beef aging in the cooler.  Anyone, who wishes to purchase a side or mixed quarter of beef, is urged to place your order very soon.  We will need to make arrangements for the cutting instructions by Wednesday, May 26th.

Also, anyone wishing to purchase a whole or side of pork should make his/her intentions known to us.  It takes two weeks to properly cure the hams and bacon and by looking at the calendar there are only two butcher dates left in which to complete custom cut pork before June 5th.

There is a limited supply of roasting chicken and lamb.  Ordering early is advised.

We have had some inquires about purchasing mixed quarters of Organic beef.  Our organic grower offers the 30 lb box of Certified Organic Angus beef.  He has a handful of cows, which do not produce enough volume of beef to supply larger quantities.   Ernst prefers to supply more customers with boxes then a few customers with quarters.

Calving is winding down for another year.  Beef Connection members have an excellent crop of calves this year that will grow into excellent roast and steaks over the next 15 to 20 months.

The chicks have been ordered and will arrive later this month.  We should have plenty of outdoor reared chicken for the September delivery.

Finally:  We know everyone has a busy life and making a commitment to purchase from Beef Connections weeks is advance is difficult not knowing if you are going to be able to make the pickup. Making arrangements for someone else to make the pickup on short notice can be onerous.  As far as Beef Connections is concerned we can manage last minute cancellations much better than last minute orders. 

The exceptions would be custom cut orders, sides and mixed quarters of beef or whole and sides of pork. These items may be cut and wrapped to specifications that Beef Connections may not be able to utilize to fill other orders.  Should an emergency arise we will hold such orders until a time that the customer can come and pickup their order at the farm.  Customers are most welcome to take a tour of our farm while they are here.

To place an order: http://www.beefconnections.ca/Order%20Forms/QuickLinks/TorontoQ.html

Other news:  As some of you may know I have been struggling with publishing our newsletter.  The number of people who wish to receive the letter greatly exceeds the allowable number of emails that email servers will process at any one time.  Google’s cut off is about 100 and they suggested using Google Groups.  I got part way through our list setting up Groups, but it soon proved to be too cumbersome and hard to manage for the numbers of subscribers we have.  I could only add so many in a 24-hour period and it was going to take a week to get through it.  Updating the list was going to be very time consuming also.

I noticed that some of the farm newsletters that we subscribe to use Phplist to manage their mailings.  I investigated this open source program and this will be my first newsletter using Phplist with our large list. 

Looking for something to do the next three Monday evenings?

I am greatly anticipating the opportunity to listen to this program.  Hope they Podcast it so I can download and listen to it if I am unable to be near a radio at show time.

http://www.cbc.ca/ideas/features/meat/index.html

CBC Radio One:  Ideas 
HAVE YOUR MEAT AND EAT IT TOO
This series will air for three consecutive Mondays starting Monday May 17th 9:04 PM.

We North Americans love our meat. It’s cheap, it’s plentiful and it’s oh so satisfying. Who, except vegetarians can resist the smell of steak, chicken or ribs sizzling on the barbeque? What was once reserved for special occasions has become our everyday fare, sometimes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Every year, the average North American chomps through 30 whole chickens, a third of a pig and a tenth of a cow - that’s about a half a pound of meat a day. And it’s not just North America. Worldwide, the per capita consumption of meat has doubled in the past half century. In this 3-part series Jill Eisen asks the question: What do we really know about the meat we buy?

Part 1 - Broadcast May 17 Once it’s butchered and packaged, most meat looks pretty much the same. Our only choice is whether to go for the boneless chicken breast or the pork chops. Most of us think more about what kind of television or which brand of toothpaste to buy than where our meat comes from. But where does it come from and what are our consumer dollars doing? 

Part 2 - Broadcast May 24 Meat is one of the most nutritious foods there is. But lately, it’s been getting a very bad rap. It’s blamed for everything from cruelty to animals to human illness to environmental destruction. For many of us, eating meat has become a kind of guilty pleasure akin to smoking. Nagging at the back of our minds is the unsettling thought that maybe we really should give it up. Might be a good idea, but on the other hand, if we stop eating animals farmers aren’t going to raise them and that could be a big problem. Jill Eisen explores the arguments for and against eating meat. 

Part 3 - Broadcast May 31 Almost all the meat and eggs you’ll find on supermarket shelves come from factory farms or feedlots - places where the animals that provide our food are kept by the thousands and where the majority never get to see the light of day. Factory farms are blamed for everything from cruelty to animals to human illness to environmental destruction. For many of us, eating meat has become a kind of guilty pleasure. Nagging at the back of our minds is the unsettling thought that maybe we really should give it up. Ten percent of North Americans already call themselves vegetarians, and their numbers are growing. But if you love your meat, don’t despair. In this final program in our series, Jill Eisen points to alternatives to factory farming that are humane, healthy and even good for the environment.

Beef Connections now has a Facebook page.  http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Beef-Connections/366273147878   This is your invitation to join us.

Regards,
Robert

 

May/June 2010 Newsletter

   Ernie Hardeman, MPP for Oxford and critic for Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, today asked the Minister of Agriculture why the McGuinty government had failed to deliver the promised support to local abattoirs.
                “If you care so much about local food and food safety why – according to your estimates - are you spending $4.3 million less this year to help small abattoirs meet the new regulations?” asked Hardeman.
                The Minister boasted about previous support for local abattoirs, but Hardeman pointed out that Public Accounts and Estimates documents released by the government showed that 25% of the funding had not been delivered. The Minister claimed that the government had spent $25.3 million when documents show it was less than $17.5 million.
                “Over a quarter of the money that you are claiming credit for never actually went out the door,” said Hardeman. “Now that you have been found out will you apologize to our small abattoirs and use the rest of the money you announced to help them? Or are you writing off the rest of Ontario’s small abattoirs?”
                Many small abattoirs have indicated that they can’t afford to meet the government’s new regulations without assistance. Some of them have already closed or indicated that may be their only option. One government MPP even wrote to the Agriculture Minister to “implore” that she look for solutions on the regulations.
                “We understand that for Ontario farmers to succeed they need processing capacity and that the many small abattoirs across the province are an important part of that system,” said Hardeman. “It is simply unfair for the government to impose heavy regulations and then mislead people about how much support they have provided for small businesses trying to meet that burden.”

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Farmers’ exodus concerns government, Valeriote says during U of G stop

May 04, 2010
Vik Kirsch
GUELPH — Canadian farmers are abandoning the field, Guelph MP Frank Valeriote said Monday as he and other federal agricultural committee members examined University of Guelph facilities on a cross-Canada tour to hear what’s ailing the agricultural sector.
“Unfortunately, they’re bailing on the industry,” Valeriote told Ontario Agricultural College dean Rob Gordon and other top officials. The demographics are grim: the nation’s lost 62 per cent of its farmers under the age of 35 over the past 15 years. Today, only eight per cent of farmers are under 35, he noted. The average age of a farmer is currently 52.
Gordon tried to show it’s not all doom-and-gloom through food production breakthroughs and research that’s stretching the boundaries of what’s agriculture, like automobile body parts made from byproducts, bioengineering expanding business opportunities and the environmental sciences opening new fields.
His college is leading the charge, with 150 faculty, four campuses, $55 million in annual research and thousands of students comprising the largest agricultural college in Canada, Gordon said.
“We see the opportunities growing and broadening more than ever before,” he said, citing as examples innovation, management, integration and production. Others cited the potential of food redesigned for health benefits beyond nutrition and new ways to remediate and protect the environment.
But Agriculture & Agrifood Committee chair Larry Miller said the future of agriculture is troubling. In a brief interview during a fast-paced tour of research labs, he said he’s heard repeatedly from farmers in recent days that there’s little profit to show for all the work and investment required.
“One of the things that keeps young people from farming is the huge capital outlay,” he said, adding farmers also consider the industry over-regulated “by every level of government” and increasingly threatened by urban sprawl.
To this, a committee member added some bankers have difficulty understanding the agricultural sector, complicating farm financing.
“There are a lot of challenges,” Valeriote said in an interview. Not the least of which is gradual replacement of family farms by large industrial operations and a retail sector increasingly dominated by supermarket chains. He called for federal reforms to protect rural Canada and provide economic supports when farm income wanes, and not just when natural disasters strike.
If changes aren’t made, farmers fear rural areas will “become ghost towns,” Valeriote said.
The 11-member committee began a fact-finding tour, though not at full strength, a week ago on the West Coast that concludes in the Maritimes on about May 14. Monday’s Guelph visit included a stop at the college’s new bioproducts discovery and development centre.

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 Lack of money to get started a big hurdle for young farmers

Posted By Don Crosby
The Number 1 problem for new farmers is money for capital expenses, said Harry and Leony Koelen, who shared their experiences before the standing committee on agriculture and agri-food in Wiarton Tuesday.
"This is pretty hard if you have to do it on your own without any help from family. Even with the help of family it is still often very hard to accomplish," said Leony Koelen.
The couple, who have a large sow operation near Paisley, won the the 2007 Ontario Outstanding Young Farmers award.
"We feel that there is a need for a startup program for young farmers in the form of a government approved loan that would come with lower or no interest payments and flexible terms," Leony Koelen said.
The committee is touring rural Canada to hear from young farmers about how Canadian agriculture can improve profitability and attract and retain young people.
The Koelens came to Canada from Holland in 1991 with a backpack and $2,000. They worked for four years before buying their first farm in Brussels. Then in 1999 they sold that farm and moved to Paisley and built their first 2,700 sow barn. In 2003 they built a second 2,700 sow barn and accumulated 1,100 acres over the years. They now employ 16 full-time and a few part-time people.
Another challenge farmers face is a difference in policies and regulations across the country. For example Quebec has a program that guarantees farmers there receive the cost of production for their goods.
"How can we in Ontario compete with that?" asked Harry Koelen, who also noted export standards for meat products are stricter than import standards are.
The couple called for an interim country of origin labeling (COOL) program to counter such legislation in the U.S., at least until Canada's appeal of the U.S. law, which is before the World Trade Organization, is dealt with.
They also want rules and regulations streamlined so they can better compete with the U.S.
"The government does not owe us farmers a living, but does need to supply us with the proper legislation and level playing field so we can make a living," Harry Koelen said.
Greg Ardiel, a fourth-generation tender fruit farmer in the Thornbury area, agreed that start-up money is a big hurdle.
"When it comes to helping youth start into farming, whether on the family farm or buying their own, the biggest challenge is quite simply cold, hard cash," said Ardiel, who recently went into business for himself with the help of his family.
He works a month on and a month off for the Canadian Coast Guard. He also rents out the main house on his farm and two rooms in another house where he lives to make extra money. He borrows equipment from his father and brother. The two relatives look after his operation while he's away at work. He couldn't do it without their help.
"Right now I'm paying to farm. This begs the question why," he said.
He also supported creating a program to lend young farmers money over the long term, interest free for the first five years and with generous payback conditions.
When he tried to get a loan from Farm Credit Canada to buy his farm he was told to go a bank to borrow the money because the FCC didn't have anything to offer him.
"I thought they were established to help farmers," he said.
"You can't get old, experienced farmers without new ones coming into the business."
Dylan Jackson, 18, of Wiarton wants to get into farming. He has six heifers and 40 sheep. But he's discouraged. He says the price for beef has hardly improved since 1988 yet the cost of production has skyrocketed.
"I don't see why any farmer would want to invest in an occupation that costs money . . . when your income is a lot less than expenses," Jackson said.
Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound MP Larry Miller, chairman of the committee, said committee members have heard similar concerns from young farmers elsewhere in the country
One of the most common complaint was over regulation by government, he said.
"We're being told in quite a few places to make the rules not nearly as onerous. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is one that's come under a lot of criticism and also the Pesticide Management Regulatory Agency and lack of harmonization of standards between the United States and Canada," said Miller.
Miller said the high cost of farming is making it much more difficult for small farmers to compete and the trend continues toward large operations.
"Some people don't like to talk about that but it's a reality. My grandfather raised 10 kids on a 100-acre farm, my dad farmed on 1,500 acres and raised seven of us kids. I raised my three boys on farms just a little under 3,000 acres. It's trend that's been happening . . ." Miller said.
The committee toured a farm operation in the Meaford area after Tuesday's hearing in Wiarton.

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Is staying small a niche market luxury?

Posted By ANN SLATER

Posted 10 days ago

There is a groundswell of interest in local food across Ontario and, as a result, more and more farmers are choosing to market their meat direct to eaters through restaurants, farmers' market stalls, farm-gate sales and small retailers, like health-food stores. In many cases, farmers are raising livestock to the specifications of their customers, whether that be certified organic, grass-fed, humanely raised or free-range. The relationship between farmer and customer is key in these local and niche markets. To maintain these relationships and the local niche market, it is absolutely essential for farmers to provide safe meat and ensure only their meat is sold to their customers.
Without abattoirs that are small enough to completely process each animal individually, this relationship between farmers and eaters cannot exist. As abattoirs grow in size, so to does their equipment. The decision for a plant to get bigger may be a good business decision and can make the plant more efficient, but as the equipment gets larger, the ability of abattoirs to process products, such as ground meat from individual animals, decreases. If my meat is batch processed with meat from other farmers, I can no longer guarantee 100% of the meat I am selling to my customer is raised on my farm or that it is raised in the same way I raise my animals.
Small abattoirs are disappearing from much of rural Ontario, and if this trend continues, the options for farmers to tap into the local meat market to help make their farms more viable will also disappear. Farmers selling meat to customers they know individually are committed to safe food. They know their customers by name -- as friends, as neighbours and as part of their community. Small provincially inspected abattoirs are providing safe meat, with an inspector on-hand when each animal is killed, unlike the situation at large plants where inspectors only have a few moments to view an animal as it moves down the line.
Some individuals and organizations have put forward their opinion that if small abattoirs would just make the investment to grow their business and get bigger, they would not be facing the struggle to survive. The suggestion has also been put forward that staying small is a luxury when it comes to small abattoirs.
Some abattoirs need to be able to stay small, so they can continue to meet the needs of farmers who provide meat to the growing numbers of eaters committed to local food across the province. Farmers interact with small abattoir owners on a daily basis and know they are committed to safe food, and are hardworking, honest and trustworthy. They also know many small plants are working at, or at close to, full capacity and each time one small plant closes, our options as farmers to increase the amount of meat we sell to local markets decreases. For farmers selling local food the ability of small abattoirs to stay small and survive is not a luxury -it is a necessity for the survival of our relationships with our customers and the survival of our farms.
Ann Slater is a board member of the National Farmers Union from Ontario. She farms in the Lakeside area of Oxford County.

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Local food movement facing challenges

Posted By JIM ALGIE

Posted 16 days ago

Even after reading Locavore, Sarah Elton's heartfelt and useful new book, I still don't entirely understand the recent rise of North American interest in local food.
I think I know what it is, how it happened and a lot about who provided leadership here and elsewhere on the continent. That's all reasonably well documented and a story I have personally embraced in this column and in my own kitchen.
For me, it's mainly about food quality. The fresher the food, the better it tastes. But there's more to it than than.
What puzzles me about local food are the whys of this social phenomenon. Why did it happen and, more particularly, why now and not 30 years ago when so many farmers wanted it to happen?
Elton is deeply informed about some of this. A Toronto based author, journalist and blogger specializing in food, she relies mainly on others for analysis and on her own reporting for the descriptions of who and what and where. The analysts she turns to include University of Guelph experts well-known in Ontario's agricultural community including Barry Smit and Tony Fuller.
Elton also introduced me to others whose work I had not known. She relies heavily, for example, on work by University of Toronto sociologist Harriet Friedman, who has identified historic "food regimes" that may contain important clues to the deeper significance of adjustments now underway.
There are fascinating chapters about local food developments in Quebec and British Columbia
that outline important distinctions in regional food culture for someone living in Southern Ontario. As well, Elton introduced me to Vancouver apple specialist Kent Mullinix, who teaches sustainable farming practices at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.
Mullinix's teaching emphasizes the growth of urban agriculture. He also has what may be the best quote of the book.
"We've become so detached from what it really is to be human," Elton quotes Mullinix as saying. "Why is eating not connected with providing sustenance to our spiritual self? . . . Every person is connected with food and with the agri-food system and they are in fact part of it. That is the promise of urban agriculture. It's connecting everyone with food in meaningful ways that transforms their perceptions of the natural world."
Elton's 230-page Harper Collins book is most notable, however, for detailed interviews with individual farmers and the chefs who have in many ways led new demand for fresh, local food. They include visits with many farmers -- a surprising number of whom are farm-raised, second and third generation proprietors -- who have discovered local markets for themselves and managed to improve farm income by tailoring their production to the desires of their own food consuming customers. These are mainly home cooks and professional chefs, people they have met in Canada's burgeoning farmers' markets.
According to Elton, Canada's markets now number more than 500 with annual sales exceeding $1 billion. That represents significant growth in total sales of low-input, minimal chemical field crops with a heavy emphasis on fresh table produce. It also includes meat and cheese from mainly grass-fed ruminant animals, eggs and meat from pastured poultry. Even so, it's a small part of total retail food sales in Canada.
Regarding that part of the food supply we now call "local food," Elton provides solid, careful observation. She shows less interest in the so-called industrial system that feeds most of us although Elton also has questions about whether or not the local food movement can ever feed the masses. Perhaps this is simply the subject for another book.
As Harriet Friedman explains quite late in Elton's text, the local food movement is still very new. It seems odd to say so when the ways of local food seem so much like the ways of our grandparents but Friedman points to what's different.
"We have no history of evolutionary experience about how to do local under these circumstances. For the first time in human history most of us live in cities. Cities were built on the most fertile land. . . . There are more people and there is less food because the farm land isn't there. We thought we'd solved all that because we could source our food from other parts of the world. Now we know that the long-distance food system is not sustainable."
Article ID# 2543403

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Food security not possible without chnaging our attitudes

George Penfold (right) speaks at the College over Coffee event Mar. 25 at Jogas. (L-R) Cher and Ron Wyers, Lizanne Eastwood; Photo, Mona Mattei
George Penfold, regional innovation chair at Selkirk College, doesn’t believe that we have a food security problem. What he does believe is that Canadians have an appetite problem instead. An appetite for inexpensive, convenient foods year round that is also reliant on using a great deal of agricultural land for one purpose – grain. If people are worried about the future of food, Penfold suggests that they start looking at how they eat.
“It’s been interesting from my perspective having been directly or indirectly involved with agriculture all my life to see the current resurgence of the whole question of food under the label of food security,” said Penfold. “But when you get into conversations about what does that actually mean, there are all kinds of different perspectives folks have about what food security means to them personally. Some of it has to do with a genuine fear about lack of food. I personally don’t buy that. Haiti has a food security problem. Somalia has a food security problem. For the most part our problem in North America is that we have too much food, or at least we consume too much food, and the wrong kind of food.”
Penfold started his position with Selkirk three years ago with the purpose of providing information and research in support of community development issues in the West Kootenay / Boundary. Food has been a big part of conversations he’s been having as his work carries him around the region. Penfold comes from a farming background so he has some insight into the farm production experience. At College over Coffee, hosted by Selkirk College at Jogas Espresso on Mar. 25, Penfold engaged in a discussion about food.
While Penfold agrees that while some people in our communities have food security problems, the average citizen doesn’t have worries about food security. He stressed that there are probably different motivations and different ways to describe the current focus on eating locally grown foods.
Some reasons are social and health perspectives of having enough to eat; environmental perspectives such as using less energy for food production and eating organically; the desire for good quality food; and the influence of lifestyle perspectives – the 100 mile diet trend. Penfold suggested that the focus really should not be food security but a drive to support regional agriculture and food self reliance.
“There has been a lot of movement toward the idea of reducing our vulnerability as consumers moving to organic food, food with less oil, pesticide chemical input and that’s also behind a longer term concern about oil – where is it going to be in price at some time down the road and what’s the consequence of that going to be in our whole production system,” said Penfold.
“A big component of agriculture strategies is how do we create jobs and improve the wealth in our community. The question is: is there a way to make our agriculture and food supply more efficient so that it can be less vulnerable to outside forces – it’s about increasing the resiliency of our food system.”
But reality takes another chunk out of the idea of self-sufficiency when it comes to food from Penfold’s view. In B.C. reports estimate that the average person consumes about 80 kilograms (KG) of grain directly and another 395 kg of feed grain consumed indirectly as meat, eggs, milk, cheese, etc. For the West Kootenay / Boundary area, with 90,000 people, self-sufficiency comes at the price of about 42,750 tonnes of grain or 17,100 hectares of grain production.
With about 53,000 hectares currently being farmed in the region (2006 Canada Census), the current 18,000 hectares of field crops would almost all have to be transferred over to grain to be truly self-sufficient in the current food lifestyle. Forget vegetables, range lands, and horse feed, the farms would all be in grain. Or we could choose to deforest many more hectares of land to meet our current food habits.
“We cannot achieve food security on our current patterns of consumption. It would be very expensive – we’d have to have greenhouses to have the food we enjoy year-round. Our consumption patterns are part of what we need to think about if we’re really serious about food security because we have a climate and a set of land and water resources that can feed us, but not in the style that we’ve become accustomed to," said Penfold.
In addition to a certain lack of available land for grain production to feed our cows, and make bread, Penfold was also very clear that, despite everything, if the actual value of agriculture doesn’t increase, there will continue to be an exodus of farmers.
In 1961, Penfold explained, Canadians spent 19% of their total household expenses on food (not including alcohol) and that decreased to 9.3% by 2005. What that means is that the average person is not willing to pay a lot for their food. The ability for a farmer to make a living from his work is critical to the availability of local food, as critical as land, water, climate, commodity marketing and processing, storage facilities, and access for customers.
We need to change our appetites, said Penfold, in order to even consider food self-sufficiency. People cannot expect to have cheap, convenient, non-resilient foods if the sources are more localized.
“As consumers it would be nice to get local food. There isn’t much of a chance of it if that’s all we’re willing to pay for it. The reality is the food that we get coming from other countries is: a) produced at industrial scale, b) produced in a climate that can generate three – five crops a year rather than one or two, c) based on very low labour rates. We can’t compete with that. But that has become part of our lifestyle,” explained Penfold.
“So as long as we expect to go to the grocery store and buy a head of romaine lettuce on a cold blustery day in February for $1.89, we’re not going to get close to self-sufficiency. This is the single most significant barrier to self-sufficiency. We are simply not willing to pay enough to farmers to grow food and generate a reasonable enough income for them and their families.”
Improved food self-sufficiency comes through the commitment of consumers, businesses and producers to regional production, processing and purchasing. But even with improved local systems, Penfold is not convinced that everything can be done in local areas.
“We’re not there yet. In the interim - grow your own, eat low energy, buy from local producers, buy ethically and stock your shelves,” advised Penfold. “Do not be reliant on Safeway for your personal food security. There’s a lot more possibilities that you can take personal responsibility for in terms of regional food self-sufficiency, that you can act on now that are possible if we can get a system in place where someone else is taking care of all that.
"In thinking about self-sufficiency, I think we need to start looking at broadening our options a little bit. I’m not sure that trying to create a wall around the Boundary, around the West Kootenay, or even around the entire region is going to get us where we want to go.” 

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February 2010 Newsletter Comments

 

February 2010 Newsletter Supplement

Hello again,
Just a short message:  Discovered this morning that I forgot to fill in the Subject Line of the Newsletter.  There is some time sensitive information included in that letter so I thought I had better send a short update just incase the first ended up in a spam/junk folder and got missed or deleted.  I have the newsletter online.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Newsletter/Newsletter_Home.html
We have received a number of gracious comments about the newsletter which makes taking the time and effort to put the newsletter together very rewarding.

Don wrote:
“Thank you for that commentary. It's a discouraging situation from almost every perspective, especially in light of the number of hours of hard work we all know you in the agricultural sector put in every day of your lives. I hope you're sending the report to your MP and anyone else who should be in a position to make some changes. “

Our farm organizations have been keeping the powers that be on both levels of government, informed about our situation.  We as farmers number less than 200,000 across Canada.  All of the full time farmers in Canada would fit in the Rogers Center.  So our voting power is sad to say non-excitant.   As long as the grocery store shelves are full of food there seems to be no sense of urgency regarding the health of Canada’s agriculture sector.  To their credit the governments do try but bureaucracy just can not seem to get it right.   Leona Dombroasky our past Agriculture Minister gave back to general revenues over $80,000,000 (before she was shuffled to Education I believe) that was in the budget to help farmers.  I am sure that 80 M went to all day kindergarten.  Our new Ag Minister now needs time to get her ducks in a row, then comes the election, then promises, then maybe who ever gets in may revisit our situation and put programs in place, find money and maybe in two or three years we might matter again.  I hope this is just my cynicism creeping through this morning, but, 37 years at this game seems to tell me otherwise.
Farmers are very independent by nature.  Making a fair and sustainable income from our labour and investment is our holy grail.  We should not have to beg and plead to government all the time for hand outs.  It sickens us.  I am quite positive that the rest of the Beef Connections members will agree when I say that, “Being involved directly with you our customers, supplying wholesome products at a fair and equitable price that affords us with a fair income for our labour, gives us great satisfaction and keeps the flame of independence flickering.”
Mother Nature we can work with whether she is for us or against us.  It is government policies both here in Canada and elsewhere in the world and corporate concentration that make us pawns in the global economy.  The buy local movement will certainly change the game plan for the betterment of farmers and the citizens of Canada.

Getting back to Don’s remarks: 
We need you, to become more involved for it is ultimately your food dollar/vote and where it goes that makes the difference.  Here are the links to the three main farm organizations.  Take some time one evening and familiarize yourself with the topics of concern and then ask “YOUR”  MP/MMP some questions that you find relative and observe what the response is.  It would be interesting to know how the urban politicians would handle that. J

Ontario NFU: http://www.nfuontario.ca/

Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario:  http://www.christianfarmers.org/

Ontario Federation of Agriculture: http://www.ofa.on.ca/

Regards,
Robert

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February 2010

Hello Everyone,

           I will begin with the Beef Connections business first then some commentary on the state of the agricultural economy.

           Beef Connections Business:

Home Page:http://www.beefconnections.ca/index.html
GTA Order Form:
http://www.beefconnections.ca/Order%20Forms/QuickLinks/TorontoQ.html
Price List: http://www.beefconnections.ca/Products/Price_List.html

 

Commentary:
           It seems every facet of our economy is using the phrase “The Perfect Storm” to describe the economy’s troubles.  There are different reasons for the different sectors and agriculture has its own.  Namely, two poor growing seasons back to back, COOL (Country of Origin Labeling) legislated by the U.S. government, the high Canadian dollar, excessive government regulations as compared to our main trading partners to the south and corporate concentration on both the farm input and output fronts.
What can I say about the last two growing seasons?  I could go on about the lack of sunshine to make dry hay or the cool nights that slowed the development of our crops that they barely had enough heat to fully mature.  But I won’t.  It is past.  Looking forward to next year’s cropping season.
I have come up with some equations so you will know when farmers are having good or poor crop years.   J
Good cottage weather = Good crops
&
Poor cottage weather = Poor crops

            COOL has caused a softening of our already weak livestock markets.  As you may know Canada exports live cattle and hogs to the US for slaughter.  The livestock industry has been doing this since there was a livestock trade because of the logistics of shipping product.  Moving livestock north and south along the coast where the markets are, is a short distance compared to the thousands of miles if livestock were traded east and west within our borders.  Now with COOL in place packers have to segregate the Canadian livestock and label according to the law.   There are different labels depending if the Canadian livestock is destined for US stores, or whether the animals were Canadian and partially raised in the US.  It is complicated, and some packing plants that may kill a thousand head an hour just don’t bother with our Canadian livestock any more.  Those packers that do process Canadian meat force our prices down to offset the extra cost of processing and labeling our animals.  There is no such policy here in Canada and US product can move in freely and be labeled however the retail stores choose to.
Our stronger dollar also has a very large impact on our prices.  Another equation:
Higher Oil Prices = Higher dollar = Lower Livestock Prices
The higher dollar also makes it profitable for other countries to import into Canada.  Once again, these factors soften our prices.
Canada is a more expensive place to raise livestock.  We have higher labour cost and more costly regulations imposed since the BSE crises with the removal of SRM’s.  Specific Risk Materials removal cost about $35.00 per head.  The US regulation on their SRM’s cost $0.08 cents!  Guess who ends up taking lower prices for their cattle so the packers and retailers can remain competitive???  We also have to harvest and store 6 months worth of feed (at least), so our animals have food for the off season. 
The pork producers have it just a bad as the cattle farmers.  The addition of subsidized (corn) ethanol in gasoline has made corn for livestock feed more expensive.  Feed accounts for about 70% of the cost of raising a pig to market.  The sad part is that the corn farmers are not making any money either because the crop input suppliers have raised their prices faster than any profits that may be realized in growing corn for fuel.

To conclude I am going to show a couple of charts.
I have calculated, since May 2003 we have received for a 750 pound carcass, $290.25 less per head than pre BSE.  I have read in the beef industry magazines that our cost of raising a beef animal has increased about $300.00 (I can vouch for that) since May of 2003.  That’s about a $600.00 short fall.  Our 50 pound box to Beef Connections Beef would be worth a little over the $310.00 if we were to get that $600.00 from the market place.  Prepare yourself for rising prices that will eventually come.  Don’t ask when, for I do not know.  What I do know is that we have 14% less brood cows according to Stats Canada than we did two years ago.  The US herd is shrinking also, but, not at the same accelerated pace as here in Canada.  I have an interesting article posted here http://www.beefconnections.ca/About.html. Note that the prices are on a live weight basis and adjusted for inflation.

 

This charts shows the Ontario Average rail grade price from
January 2001 until December 2009

This chart shows the serious financial trouble the pork business is experiencing.  How many businesses can survive this long and deep down turn?  The Canadian government is presently paying hog farmers to quit.  They have allocated $75,000,000 for this purpose.  There are four rounds of tenders the last is taking place in a few weeks.  How it works:  The farmers who want to quit tender on a per sow

basis.  The lowest tenders are accepted until the allotted money for that round is utilized.  This is not going to decrease our production by the 30 to 50% which some analyst suggest we need to return to profitability, but it will help.  My worry, if this decrease does happen there is not going to be enough pigs to keep the big packing plants in business.  They have warned us already about this.  Then what happens?  Our governments in all their wisdom have made it impossible for many of our small local abattoirs to stay in business because of the expensive upgrades that inspectors were imposing.  They couldn’t afford the cost or they were old enough that they wouldn’t realize any possible return on the investment.  So, they quit.  Now we can run into a situation were we won’t have enough kill capacity for our local hogs and beef for the Ontario market. 

There are many more issues I could address.  There will be opportunities………another time.
Comments or questions are welcome.

Best Regards,
Robert Huber
robert.huber101@gmail.com
Gayle Weber: 1-866-267-5876

If you wish to Unsubscribe from the Beef Connections Newsletter follow this link and scroll to the bottom and fill out the appropriate boxes.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Newsletter/Subscribe.html   

 

 

November 2009 Newsletter

Hello Everyone,

We have had our largest number of new, newsletter subscribers’ register ever, since the September letter was published. We would like to thank them for having an interest and taking the time to search out local farms and local food.

We have two deliveries coming up.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Locations/Dates_&_Times.html

The first is on Saturday, November 21st for our Pickering customers.  Doug and Gayle Weber will be at the Dunbarton-Fairport United Church at 2:00 PM.

The second Toronto delivery is taking place on Saturday, November 28th at our three regular locations.

Any customers that are considering purchasing custom orders of beef (side or mixed quarter), the beef is aging now and the butcher will need the cutting and wrapping instructions on or before Wednesday, November 11th.  Place your order and we will then pass along the butchers contact information so you talk to them directly.

Any customers that are considering purchasing custom orders of pork (side or whole) should order on or before Wednesday, November 11th.  The butcher will need the cutting and wrapping instructions by Wednesday also.  We will pass along the contact information after we receive the order.

We have a very limited number of boxes of chicken available.  Some of early orders have requested some chicken if available.  We can fill those requests.  The remaining boxes of chicken will go on a first come basis. 

If ordering some of our pork product is your agenda, the sooner the better.  We only have two dates left on which to make appointments with the abattoir.  It takes 10 days to cure the hams and bacon, so time is slipping by.

We have several different pages from which to place orders.  There are two list boxes just under the header.  The one on the left is best if you are accessing from a desktop computer and the one on the right is best suited for smart phones.  The third option is here http://www.beefconnections.ca/Order%20Forms/HomePage/Pickering.html and herehttp://www.beefconnections.ca/Order%20Forms/HomePage/Toronto.html.  These pages should have descriptions of the various products we are providing.  I say, “should have”, because I have a hard time getting motivated and finding the time to complete them.  If you need product information, don’t hesitate to call or email.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Contact_Us.html   Please enter the words “Beef Connections” plus your input in the subject line of the email.  This will lessen the chance that my software will mistaken your email for Junk mail.  Much appreciated!

We are going to be holding the auction again!  We have had so much positive feedback we just have to continue. Up for sale will be two whole cured hams.  We will sell them individually with two auctions.  We have not picked them up from the butcher yet, so we don’t have the weights.  What I can tell you is that these hams came from a Berkshire pig and will make a great centerpiece for the holiday get-together family meal.  More information will be posted on the website when it becomes available. http://www.beefconnections.ca/Auction/Auction_Index.html 

I will be emailing our customers that have registered when the auction is about to start.  If you wish to receive this email and/or take part in the auction, please register here.  http://www.beefconnections.ca/Auction/Auction_Register.html

I hope I have covered everything.  If not I will have to send out an update.  Since notice time is short for our Pickering customers (the November 21st date was just confirmed a couple of days ago) I wanted to get this message out before the end of work today for some only have access to the internet via the workplace.

Looks like the weekend is going to be super weather wise.  The snow is melting here today, under bright sunshine.   I am now going to service our harvest equipment for we will be able to continue on with corn harvest tomorrow as the fields continue to firm up.

Hope everyone is keeping healthy.  We think some of our kids have had the H1N1 flu.  They were down for a couple days and then recovered quite quickly.

Anyway………  take care, enjoy the sun!

Robert

(On behave of Beef Connections)