Popeye’s franchisee in trouble

 

Irfan Memon has lost seven franchises for  Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen  restaurants in the Toronto area and another seven have been shut down in a receivership.

Memon employees raised allegations of unpaid wages leading to receivership with debts of about $10.8-million.

Memon, is also a major defendant in a lawsuit filed in May against Popeyes, its parent company Restaurant Brands International Inc.  and Toronto-area franchisees. 

Companies controlled by Memon operated seven out of 27 locations listed in that lawsuit, in which a former poultry supplier to Popeyes, ADP Direct Poultry Ltd., accused the restaurants of buying “unsafe” meat from an unauthorized supplier. 

The allegations have not been tested in court, and Restaurant Brands has said, most recently in July, that it found no evidence of those claims.

Despite that disclaimer, shortly after ADP’s lawsuit was filed, Restaurant Brands raised questions with Mr. Memon’s companies about where his restaurants were buying their meat.

In a notice of termination of their franchise agreement, sent on Sept. 18, Popeyes stated that it had advised Memon’s companies in June of “significant discrepancies” between the quantity of chicken the restaurants were buying from approved suppliers and the quantity of chicken that they sold. 

The notice said the franchisee had not provided “sufficient or satisfactory” explanation of those discrepancies.

U.S. announces beef rebuild plan

United States Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins unveiled the government’s promised and Trump-touted plan to rebuild the beef industry, but ranchers and packers were far from thrilled by the modest proposals.

“At USDA  (United States Department of Agriculture) we are protecting our beef industry and incentivizing new ranchers to take up the noble vocation of ranching,” Rollins said. 

“Today, USDA will immediately expedite deregulatory reforms, boost processing capacity, including getting more locally raised beef into schools, and working across the government to fix longstanding common-sense barriers for ranchers like outdated grazing restrictions.”

 

For the third prong — “Building Demand Alongside Domestic Supply” — the document states only that school nutrition programs will be encouraged to use locally grown foods including beef, and the 2025–2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) will be released by Dec. 31.

For packers, the big-ticket promise is no overtime for meat inspectors staffing relatively small packing plants.

For deregulation, the main promise relates to leases on government lands, but the details will come in mid-November.

And Brooke said her officials will set up meetings to listen to farmers and ranchers concerns and ideas.

The U.S. beef herd has hit an historic low, cattle prices set records, packers are losing money and retail beef prices are high.

To encourage young people to take up ranching, Brooke announced that USDA’s Risk Management Agency is widening the availability of premium subsidies to newer ranchers.

But the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association said it cannot support the Trump administration as long as it relaxes import controls on beef  from Argentina.

Trump gets pushback on beef plans

 

United States President Donald Trump is getting pushback from his own party politicians from leading beef-ranching states over his plans to allow more beef from Argentina into the country.

And some are suggesting it would be better to provide incentives to cull dairy cows for produced-in-the-United States beef, noting it would also reduce excess milk production.

Senator Deb Fischer of Nebraska, who is a rancher, said she has voiced her “deep concerns” to the White House.

“Bottom line: if the goal is addressing beef prices at the grocery store, this isn’t the way. Right now, government intervention in the beef market will hurt our cattle ranchers,” she said in a statement. 

“The U.S. has safe, reliable beef, and it is the one bright spot in our struggling ag economy. Nebraska’s ranchers cannot afford to have the rug pulled out from under them when they’re just getting ahead or simply breaking even,” she said.

Senator Paul Rand from Kentucky noted that Trump is imposing many tariffs to protect American businesses and opening the door to more beef from Argentina runs counter to Trump’s key policy.

Manitoba adds sustainability

Manitoba Pork is adding sustainability to its standards for producers.

There are standards for animal care, community well-being, collaborative growth, economic resilience and environmental stewardship.

Farmers must be good stewards of the land, which means growing crops, raising livestock and moving what they’ve grown and raised to market sustainably, saide Manitoba Pork in a  document announcing the new protocols.

The Sustainability Framework also focuses on the role Manitoba Pork plays in supporting hog farmers identify potential targets, explaining other outside impacts on producers and identifying areas where collaboration with partners is essential.

The program will also focus on efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which are lower as a result increased efficiencies on hog farms that have included reduced water and energy use and lower carbon emissions, Manitoba Pork said.

Pork training gains internet attention

 

A Canadian online training program for people hired to work on hog farms has gained international attention because it is posted on swineweb, a site for the global pork industry.

The PigLEARN platform, developed by the Canadian Pork Council , provides a centralized system to deliver structured training, certify learning progress, and document compliance across a workforce.

PigLEARN was designed to meet the growing need for standardized onboarding, biosecurity preparedness, and continuous education across swine production systems. The platform currently includes 86 industry-developed training modules, with an additional 10 modules soon to be added.

According to Mark Fynn, training resources coordinator with the pork council,  PigLEARN functions as a full learning management system tailored specifically to the swine industry. It enables employees to log in, access modules, and complete training online, while managers can assign modules, schedule completion timelines, and track progress in real time.

Key training areas include:

·       Barn entry and biosecurity protocols

·       Pig handling and welfare

·       Group sow housing management

·       Preparing pigs for transport

·       Sow barn management and care best practices

Fynn said “this isn’t just about compliance – it’s about building confidence, improving animal care, and elevating overall barn performance.”

It is flexible enough to be useful to any size of farm.

Managers are able to create user groups by barn or role, tp assign training schedules, track completion records and demonstrate compliance for audits or certification programs

It helps train newcomers, improves employee retention, and ensures consistent training delivery across multiple sites or barns.

The platform will be showcased during the upcoming Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium, November 4–5 in Saskatoon, where producers will have the opportunity to see it in action and explore implementation strategies.

Provincial marketing boards have information on how to get the program.

Food prices continue to rise

 

Food prices rose by four per cent in September, continuing to increase more than the general inflation rate since spring.

The overall inflation rate was 2.4 per cent, exceeding the Bank of Canada goal of two per cent.

The main food price increases were fresh vegetables, processed foods with lots of sugar, fresh and frozen beef and coffee.

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Moonfleet wins third appeal

 

Emily Crocco, chair of the Canada Agricultural Review Tribunal, has tossed a fine levied against Mid Peninsula Carriers Inc., a sister company of Moonfleet Poultry Inc. of Fergus, over trucking chickens to a packing plant.

It was an official from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs who investigated, although the alleged violations were of the federal government’s Health of Animals Regulations.

Inspector Vadym Turchenko said dead and dying birds reported by Abate Rabbit Packers included ones at the bottom level of the truck and were wet because it rained all night.

But weather data entered as evidence indicated there was no rain. And Turchenko arrived at the plant hours after the chickens had been unloaded and could not know whether they were in crates at the bottom of the truck.

Speculation about how they might have got wet was just that – speculation.

It was the third tribunal win in as many days for Moonfleet.