Guelph ranked 12th for agriculture

I was wrong when I said the University of Guelph has lost its reputation as a leading agricultural college.

In fact, it is ranked 12^th among agricultural universities and fifth in North America in the most recent assessment by U.S. New and World Report.

It is the 30^th report by the magazine.

The top two schools were Wageningen University in the Netherlands and the University of California, Davis.

By categories, Guelph ranked 38th in plant and animal science and 91st in environment/ecology.

“Our overall impact is due to the quality and exceptional efforts of our faculty, staff and students,” said Rob Gordon, dean of the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) in a news release from the university.

“Their commitment, passion and dedication to identifying new innovations and discoveries that support the growth and significance of our agriculture and food sectors are the reasons for this global recognition and a key area of differentiation for U of G,” Gordon said.

In North America, Cornell, the University of Florida and Harvard were all ahead of Guelph for agriculture.

But Guelph was ahead of many well-known agricultural universities such as Iowa State, Purdue, Texas A&M and state universities in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Minnesota.

Guelph gets a huge boost from the provincial government's funding for agricultural research. That pays for a lot of faculty and so the student:faculty ratio always looks great.

As for how much the university contributes to the economy, I still believe it does a lousy job of commercializing its research.

GMO labeling on ballots today

Voters in Colorado and Oregon are being asked if they want to force food companies to label products that contain genetically-modified ingredients, such as Roundup-Ready corn and soybeans.

Farmers and agriculture groups are just bit players in the $11 million campaign to defeat Proposition 105, reports Associated Press news service.

“The real money is coming from biotechnology giant Monsanto Co., which has given more than $4.7 million, and food giants like Pepsico and Coca-Cola, which sent a combined $1.9 million to fighting the proposal,” AP says.

Hormel Foods, Kraft Foods, Kellogg Co. and The Hershey Co. are also outspending farm groups to fight the proposal. Food companies are pouring big money into fighting a similar ballot measure in Oregon, AP says.

"We're not saying GMOs are bad. We're saying we want them to be labeled," said Tammi DeVille Merrell, campaign manager for Right To Know Colorado, which has raised less than $500,000 and has no TV or radio ads to promote its campaign.

CWB wants a partner, not a buyer

The Canadian Wheat Board is not for sale, says the board’s chief strategy officer, Dayna Spiring.

“I think there is a misunderstanding about what CWB is trying to do,” she told the Manitoba Cooperator.

“We’re not selling the CWB and that’s never been our goal.

“We’ve said all along we want farmers to play a role in the CWB. “That’s what our farmer equity is there to do. We want farmers to be a significant shareholder in the CWB.

“We need to bring an investor in to partner with farmers to replace the federal government," she said.

In other words the board wants a new sugar daddy.

Good luck with that!

We’re not selling off the CWB and this is not a sale as anyone would typically see a sale,” she said.

Nor has CWB accelerated the privatization process, she said. CWB has long said it wants to complete the privatization process required under federal legislation sooner than later.

The legislation says CWB must present a plan to the agriculture minister by 2016 and privatize or wind up operation by 2017.

Last week, Farmers of North America (FNA) announced CWB rejected its bid to acquire CWB’s assets.

FNA wants to create a majority farmer-owned grain-handling and -marketing company that also distributes fertilizer, including nitrogen FNA hopes will be produced by its proposed majority farmer-owned nitrogen-manufacturing company, known as ProjectN.

Spiring declined to comment on FNA’s bid.

However, she said CWB, which is being assisted in the privatization process by Deloitte, wants to get the best deal it can for farmers.

“We’re going to make sure we come up with the right plan and do all the due diligence that we can to assure CWB is a strong and viable organization going forward,” she said.

Chicken deal collapses

Members of the national chicken marketing agency thought they had a deal July 8 on dividing the national pie into provincial pieces.

Alberta, which pulled out of the national agency at the end of last year, seemed satisfied with this deal.

But, reports Ron Friesen of the Manitoba Cooperator, “Ontario held back.”

There has been nothing posted on the Ontario board’s website about this situation. 

But, then again, there has always been a lot of secrecy surrounding what the Ontario chicken board is up to.

Friesen says “another agreement appeared close on September 9 but Nova Scotia, with only a small fraction of Canada’s chicken supply, inexplicably balked.

“Nova Scotia subsequently put forward a counter proposal, which was discussed in mid-October.”

No announcement came from that meeting. I guess there's still no deal.

This is beyond ludicrous. It is an arrogant abuse of the privilege of supply management.

But it begs the question of why the National Farm Products Council, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz and Prime Minister Stephen Harper allow this to continue. I guess Canadian consumers don't count for diddly-squat.

Friesen says the Canadian Chicken Poultry and Egg Processors Council is watching the situation carefully because differential growth will influence its chicken supplies.

Not only are they watching closely, Friesen. They are meddling. They are as responsible as farmers for inexplicable and unconscionable  situations in the national chicken industry.

“At the end of the day, we all signed an agreement in 2001 that said there would be differential growth based on comparative advantage and we’ve never implemented it,” said Wayne Hiltz, Manitoba Chicken Producers executive director.

In other words, that agreement is not worth the paper it was written on. And the promises made by the provincial chicken boards are meaningless.

For decades, Ontario has argued that there should be “differential growth” to reflect population and consumer demand. The other provinces and the processors have consistently throttled Ontario.

Why Ontario remains in the national agency is a good question. It's not to preserve supply management, as was argued back in the days when imports were controlled by quotas which depended on Canada maintaining national supply management.

Now imports are restricted by tariffs which will exist whether or not there is national supply management.

Alberta has pulled out of the national agency, not once, but twice, to gain the right to grow more chickens. Why not Ontario? 

The national agency is so dysfunctional that several times, when innovative retailers and processors in Ontario have launched new products, they’ve been unable to source chickens in Ontario while the national agency has allocated more birds to far-away provinces, such as Saskatchewan and Prince Edward Island.

Ontario wimped out every time, even sometimes watching U.S. chicken come into Ontario to meet demand.

I recall writing about Elmira Poultry being so short of chicken it trucked eviscerated chicken from Newfoundland where they were grown with feed subsidized by the federal and provincial governments at a processing plant built with provincial funding. And in a province where the son of former Premier Jimmy Smallwood was the largest quota holder.

Glenn Black wonders why he can't persuade the chicken industry to adopt his sensible proposal to allow non-quota-holding farmers to grow up to 2,000 chickens a year.

That's nit-picking in comparison with the ludicrous inequities that persist in the industry.

A video on sow housing launched

After dozens of the largest pork retailers have succumbed to pressure from the Humane Society of the United States to agree to bans on housing sows in gestation crates, the American Meat Institute has come out with a video to educate the public.

I guess it's better late than never.

This latest installation of the MythCrusher video series “seeks to clarify controversy and confusion over modern sow housing by taking viewers on a tour of a sow housing operation and explaining the humane handling considerations that go into housing systems for pregnant sows,” says Meatingplace Magazine.

The video features Stacy Scramlin, assistant professor of animal science at South Dakota State University, and Janet Riley, AMI senior vice president of public affairs and liaison to the animal welfare committee, touring a modern, biosecure hog facility where visitors must shower in and out.

“Housing for pregnant sows is a complex issue that can be complicated by emotion and misinformation,” said Riley.

On the video, Scramlin discusses several issues that must be considered when selecting the best sow housing for a particular farm, including management of feed and water as well and protection of sows from one another.

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association, welfare is determined by several factors, not just the housing system.

“Regardless of the system, as long as it is managed properly, that is the most important thing for the wellbeing of the animal,” said Scramlin.

The Meat MythCrusher video series is produced by AMI in conjunction with the American Meat Science Association.

The series, now in its fifth year, includes 39 videos. Topics include antibiotic use, “superbugs” in meat, Meatless Monday, hormone use, ammonia in ground beef and grass-fed beef.

                           

Raw sprouts are risky food

Raw sprouts are risky food because harmful bacteria on seed can multiply rapidly under the warm and moist conditions used to sprout seed.

Jimmy John's restaurant stopped using raw sprouts on its sandwiches after some of its customers were sickened.

But then another customer sued because the restaurant chain would not put sprouts on her sandwiches, despite advertising them on its menus.

Jimmy John's switched from alfalfa to clover sprouts.

And then harmful bacteria showed up on the clover sprouts, so it simply stopped putting sprouts on its menus and won't sell them any more.

But it has agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit by paying off customers who wanted sprouts on their sandwiches while that option was still on their menus.

Maybe these customers also want to buy unpasteurized milk and cider.

But maybe, if and when they get sick, they should expect to get thrown under the bus.

Cider recall expands

The recall of cider made by Rolling Acres Farm near Waterloo has expanded to include sales by Oseleo Wildcrafters.

Jacob Martin, owner of Rolling Acres, apparently told a reporter for the Waterloo Region Record that his family has been making and marketing unpasteurized apple cider for more than 100 years, that he has loyal customers who want to keep on buying his unpasteurized cider and that he might go underground.

Somebody ought to take him out to a woodshed and give him a good lickin' before he sickens more innocent customers.