Young steers and heifers enjoy bakery items from Save-On-Foods.

Turning food waste into livestock feed

Jill Burkhardt shares her experience with a program that allows farmers to recycle grocery store shrink

Doughnuts, broccoli, pineapples, bread, cakes and cookies — sounds like some things you’d eat during the week? Well, it’s what our feeder cattle eat. Yes, you read that right, our feeders eat doughnuts, fruits, vegetables and cakes. How? It’s all thanks to a program called Loop and a local grocery store chain, Save-On-Foods. Loop started […] Read more

Anita Stewart. (FoodDayCanada.ca)

Canadian food laureate Anita Stewart, 73

Guelph flags to be lowered for Food Day Canada founder

Flags at the University of Guelph are to be flown at half-mast Tuesday in honour of Canadian food advocate Anita Stewart, who died Thursday in hospital in Hamilton. Stewart, 73, was the first person in the world to be conferred with the title of “food laureate,” as she was named by the University of Guelph […] Read more


(LIVINUS/iStock/Getty Images)

Foreign worker isolation support extended

Federal program extended alongside federal restrictions

The federal program helping employers of temporary foreign workers (TFWs) cover the costs of isolating new workers for two weeks on their arrival in Canada has been extended through November. Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau announced Monday that the Mandatory Isolation Support for Temporary Foreign Workers Program will now run to Nov. 30, as the government […] Read more

(CBSA via YouTube)

Feds seek feedback on farm worker living conditions

Consultations focused on 'primary agriculture' labour stream of TFWs

Improving and standardizing living conditions for temporary foreign workers (TFWs) in Canada — specifically, those on Canadian farms — is the subject of a new round of federal consultations. Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough and Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau on Tuesday announced consultations are now underway until Dec. 22 with “provinces and territories, employers, workers, worker […] Read more


Lana Popham. (B.C. NDP via Flickr, license at Creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/)

B.C. ag minister, critic expected to win re-election

NDP projected to form majority government

British Columbia’s incumbent agriculture minister and opposition ag critic both appear set to head back to the provincial legislature as the New Democrats are projected to end three years of tentative minority governing. John Horgan’s NDP, which in 2017 overturned a minority Liberal government with the help of the Green Party, was projected Saturday evening […] Read more

Sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies over the southern Pacific for the week centred on Sept, 30, 2020. (CPC.ncep.noaa.gov)

La Nina to bring colder, drier winter

MarketsFarm — There’s a La Nina poised to exert influence on the coming North American winter, according to Drew Lerner, senior agricultural meteorologist for World Weather Inc. in Kansas. A La Nina generates colder-than-normal temperatures, as opposed to the warm temperatures garnered from an El Nino. Both weather phenomenon can be found over the Pacific […] Read more


File photo of a quality control check on fresh peppers in a Canadian vegetable packing plant. (Jeffbergen/E+Getty Images)

Federal program to protect farms, workers from COVID-19 underway

'Highest-risk' farming operations to get priority, Bibeau says

Applications are now open for a federally-administered $35 million emergency on-farm support fund to help limit the impacts of COVID-19 on farms and on-farm workers. Aimed at farm workplaces and employee living quarters, the fund is being managed by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC), but cost-shared with participating producers at a 50-50 level. Money is […] Read more

Ross Wetmore. (Video screengrab from NBPCCaucus via YouTube)

New Brunswick returns ag minister, ag critic in election

Liberals' former ag minister among casualties

New Brunswick’s incumbent agriculture minister and opposition ag critic are among those returning to the legislative assembly as the provincial Tories locked in a governing majority. As of 9 p.m. CT Monday, incumbent Premier Blaine Higgs’ Progressive Conservatives, who went into the vote with a 22-seat minority government, were elected in 27 of 49 ridings. […] Read more


Officials at the Aug. 13, 2020 rollout of the federal surplus food program included (l-r) Julie Marchand of Food Banks of Quebec, Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, Claude Dulude of Nutri Group, Marie-Jose Mastromonaco of Second Harvest, Tania Little of Food Banks Canada and Serge Lefebvre of Nutri Group. (Photo courtesy Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada)

Feds line up projects for surplus food program

NGOs backed to gather, distribute 12 million kg of food

The federal government has lined up eight projects to source and distribute perishable produce, meat, eggs and seafood piling up across Canada due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of the federal pandemic response, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced in early May that Ottawa would budget $50 million for a food surplus purchase program. The […] Read more

File photo of 10-pound sacks of potatoes loaded on pallets at a Canadian distribution centre. (PierreDesrosiers/iStock/Getty Images)

Federal surplus food program now taking applications

Qualified NGOs sought to move, distribute perishables to 'populations in need'

A federal program to get food to those who need it, using stockpiles of perishables created by the COVID-19-related shutdown of the dining sector, is now taking applications. The $50 million Surplus Food Rescue Program — which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau telegraphed in a funding announcement May 5 — will take applications from “organizations addressing […] Read more