Chapman’s spurns American suppliers

Chapman’s Ice Cream is busy replacing suppliers in the United States with ones in Canada and other countries.

It’s Chapman’s response to President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods.

It aims to it replace more than 70 per cent of its American ingredients and won't increase prices for two years -.i.e. to March 2028.

One of the big changes involves sugar cones.

There are no producers of industrial sugar cones in Canada, so the company partnered with Original Foods, a company outside Hamilton, to bring in a cone oven, Chapman said.

“We are going to be the only company in Canada who has a 100 per cent Canadian cone line."

Original Foods Limited will produce the sugar cones for Chapman's. The Dunnville, Ont.-based manufacturer tapped the ice cream retailer a few months ago when trade talks with Canada and the U.S. intensified. 

"We knew there will be opportunities for customers who are currently buying in the U.S. to look for local manufacturing and we approached Chapman's to discuss if they would be interested to buy locally," said president Steeve Tremblay.  

Chapman's is also moving production of wafers used in its ice cream sandwiches to Canada and is sourcing ingredients such as almonds from Australia and cherries from Chile.

 

Chapman said some of the changes are long-term commitments, including the five-year contract for Canadian-made cones.

Chapman’s is also working to make its production more efficient to help control costs, he added.

“I am fully confident that we are going to make it to the other side of this,” Ashley Chapman told CBC Radio London, Ont.

 The company said it will continue to use 100 per cent Canadian dairy in its ice cream. 

I find that generous because I well remember reporting on the difficulties the family had starting its business at Markham and because the milk marketing board ran a plant supply program, it would not supply all the milk Chapman's needed to grow its business.

It's one of a few reasons why I am no fan of milk supply management marketing boards.

CFIA suspends a licence, cancels another

 

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has suspended the licence held by  G.B. La Référence Inc. of Montreal and has cancelled the licence held by Animals Halal Sano Inc. of Lasalle, Que,

It said G.B. La Référence fell short on the identification of hazards, a preventive control plan, recall procedures and product traceablility.

Animals Halal Sano had its licence suspended in December.

Where's the beef?

Global beef production is expected to decline by two per cent this year, according to Rabobank’s quarterly report on beef.

Rabobank expects production to fall in the United States, Brazil, China and Europe, with the global contraction expected to continue over the next 12 months. The tighter production outlook comes as trade flows shift in response to declining supplies, tariffs and import restrictions.

In the U.S., declining domestic production and historically tight cattle supplies have driven record beef imports. It’s beef imports increased by 11 per cent from a year earlier to a record 3.3 billion pounds during the first six months of 2026. 

Australia, Mexico and Argentina accounted for much of the growth, increasing shipments by 99 million, 91 million and 71 million pounds, respectively.

Cattle and beef prices reached highs across nearly every major U.S. market category during the second quarter before retreating sharply entering the third quarter. 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s all-fresh retail beef price peaked at $10 per pound in April, while 500-pound and 800-pound steer prices reached record monthly averages of $5.17 and $3.68 per pound, respectively. Fed steers averaged $2.59 per pound in May.

Since those highs, cattle prices have declined by between8 eight and 16 per cent, reducing farm and ranch revenues by an estimated $200 to $500 per head depending on the market segment, according to Rabobank. 

Ample frozen beef inventories also allowed wholesale buyers to resist additional price increases during the summer grilling season.

International trade shifts could put additional beef into the U.S. market during the second half of the year. 

Australia and Brazil could become increasingly dependent on U.S. buyers as both countries reach safeguard quotas for exports to China.

The Trump administration has also said it is increasing import quotas by 300,000 pounds.

Feds renew innovation funding

 

Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) announced that it will award $50-million to the Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network (CAAIN).

It enables CAAIN to launch new programming, beginning this fall.

CAAIN will continue to focus on its primary mandate of funding the development and adoption of innovation that increases the productivity, profitability, and/or sustainability of our nation’s agricultural

producers, it said.

Over the past six years, we have committed more than $42M of ISED dollars to 56 projects whose total value exceeds $133M.million said board chair Laura Kilcrease.

Thirty projects have completed their CAAIN funding cycle, a number have successfully gone to market, validating ISED’s and our faith in their

long-term value and effectively providing taxpayers a strong return on investment, a news release said.

“To say we appreciate ISED’s belief in us and what we do would be an understatement. As someone who once farmed, I can’t begin to express the importance of the investments the ISED program allows,” she said.

Lambton has new venue for plowing match

 

The Ontario Plowmen’s Association has secured aa farm owned by Clayton and Linda McLauchlin for the 2027 International Plowing Match and Rural Explo.

It is east of Petrolia in Lambton County.

Earlier this summer, the Lambton County Plowmen’s Association withdrew its offer to host the match.

Then a week later the Ontario Plowmen’s Association said it would go ahead with the match in Lambton County.

The OPA said the Petrolia Line property has the perfect open landscape, easy access, and major operational footprint needed to pull off an event of this scale.

The OPA said it demonstrated the county’s ability to bring together agriculture, innovation, community leadership, and visitors from across Ontario.

The match is to be held Sept. 21 to 25, 2027.

U.S. blames Canada for failed trade talks

In an interview with CBC News on Wednesday, United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the Canadian side had new requests when Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc returned from Ottawa after the tentative deal was struck on Aug. 18.

"We had agreed to, as I've shared before in the press, really the best deal available to any country on the planet with respect to Canada," Greer told CBC News chief political correspondent Rosemary Barton in his first one-on-one interview with a Canadian news outlet since trade talks broke down on Friday. 

"When [LeBlanc] came back, they had some additional views. They had some additional requests. They had some additional things that that were too much for the United States."

Yet when Trump was asked who in the U.S. weighed in with last-minute changes, he said “that sounds like me.”

Animal rights activists face uphill battle

 

With food prices escalating, animal rights groups are fighting an uphill battle to persuade the public to buy the scarce meat products they endorse.

Free-range chickens, pasture-raised pigs and chickens all command significant pride premiums.

A July Washington Post-Ipsos poll found that two-thirds of adults describe groceries as “unaffordable”—up more than 20 points since February and that’s for conventionally-raised meat and eggs.

Animal rights activists have had some success with California’s Proposition 12, which bans the sale of non-cage-free eggs and pork produced with the use of individual maternity pens, but now outdoor access seems to be next.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals recently issued a supermarket guide for consumers on what kind of animal protein to buy. 

It only endorsed pasture-based systems, while also admitting that very little animal protein produced today actually meets these requirements. In fact, 99% per cent of poultry doesn’t satisfy it’s standards.

Allowing animal rights activists—many of whom don’t even eat meat—to dictate farming practices is not sustainable for family budgets, wrote Jack Hubbard in an on-line post.

Not everyone can afford expensive Whole Foods grocery carts. Veterinarians and farmers should be calling the shots, he wrote.