Chicken production curbed

For the first time in decades, Ontario is going to reduce chicken production this fall.

The allocation from the national agency is two per cent below base and amounts to 64,596,426 kilograms for quota period A-165 which is this fall.

It also means that for the first time Ontario will not get more production than the historic market shares established when the national agency was formed. 

There has been an agreement that Ontario would get additional market share whenever production targets are set to increase.

Ontario has used those increases to launch production programs for small-scale producers who do not require quota and for production for artisanal markets.

The reductions come because the COVID-19 pandemic has closed restaurants, cafeterias and tourist destinations that often feature chicken meals.

The Chicken Farmers of Ontario marketing board said demand is beginning to recover.

Federal-provincial help for beef and hog farmers

The federal and provincial governments are offering up to $10 million to help beef and hog farmers experiencing difficulty getting their livestock to slaughter.

There is $5 million for beef farmers who can claim $2 a day for feeding market-ready cattle until they can be slaughtered.

The hog sector support program is $5 million to process and package surplus pork for food banks.

“This will assist the pork processing industry with managing capacity while helping those in need,” the joint government announcement said.

Arend Flinkert dead at 83

Arend Flinkert, at one time owner of the largest dairy herd in Ontario, has died. He was 83.

He overcame a number of challenges, including two outbreaks of brucellosis that forced him to liquidate his entire herd, and a tragic accident when three workers entered a mobile manure tank and died.

He is survived by his wife and four children.

As a reporter for the Kitchener-Waterloo Record, I wrote about these events.

The funeral will be Saturday at the Drayton Reformed Church, and it will be available via YouTube.

The family asks that expressions of sympathy be donations to Palmerston Memorial Hospital.

Meat workers staying home

Between 30 and 50 per cent of workers for meat packers in the United States are staying home, says the United Food and Commercial Workers Union.

The union, which represents about 80 per cent of meatpacking workers, on Monday confirmed a Reuters news report that cited the 30 to 50 per cent absenteeism figures for the second week of June.

Reuters said major pork packers were operating at about 75 per cent capacity, according to the union, which stressed that absenteeism varies by plant, roughly 20 of which have been closed, and later reopened.

Cargill, National Beef and Smithfield Foods — all referenced by Reuters as contending with high rates of absenteeism —  did not immediately return requests by Meatingplace Magazine for comment.

Tyson Foods said there has been “substantial improvement” at its pork plants at Waterloo and Columbus Junction in Iowa since it began widespread COVID-19 testing in April.

Grocers held the line on beef prices

Kevin Grier says supermarkets held the line on beef prices while what they paid at wholesale cost them much more after the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

The big question now is whether Loblaws, Sobeys and Metro will try to recover beef margins by increasing prices.

Grier said he doubts any of them will feature beef in weekly sales flyers and said they will be worried that Walmart and Costco may hold their beef margins tight.

What happened after COVID-19 hit resulted in a decline of more than 60 per cent in beef packing production from the end of March to May 2. 

“The big declines in beef production drove the grocer’s costs to record levels,” Grier says.  

“For the most part grocers absorbed those cost increases and did not pass them along to consumers,” he said.

Grier is a veteran analyst of supermarket food marketing , corporate food processing and farm production.

He said it’s surprising that the retailers were able to keep beef stocks available throughout the pandemic.

There were empty shelves in the beginning, but not because beef production had declined then, but because shoppers were hoarding, just as they did with toilet paper and flour.

“Looking back and a little bit forward, it can be easily argued that the beef supply chain performed very well during this very stressful pandemic. Despite that strong performance and the grocer’s role in keeping supplies balanced, they have been blamed for hiking prices. Nothing could be further from the truth,” Grier wrote in his market observations.

That said, retail beef prices did increase by about 8.5 per cent in April.

Feds open food donation program

The federal government has opened its promised $50-million surplus food program to applications from those needing the food.

Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau said in a release that “eligible applicants include for-profit and not-for-profit organizations (industry groups, processors, distributors, food serving agencies, regional and municipal governments and agencies (can include schools or school boards) that can demonstrate an ability to handle the full logistical requirements for acquiring, processing, transporting and ensuring shelf-life stability of surplus commodities and delivery to organizations serving vulnerable populations. “

 Information on the application process is available through the Surplus Food Rescue Program.

Maple Leaf launches 50/50 meat/plant protein products

Maple Leaf Foods Inc. is launching a line of products that are half meat, half plant protein.

They will be available in all of Canada’s major supermarket chains.

They are a burger, dinner sausages, breakfast sausages and a ground product imitating ground beef.