Cge150217

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eastern edition

February 17, 2015 $3.50

food fight get that

MiDAS Touch

how the u.s. is winning, and sometimes losing its biggest battle Pg. 20

OYF president Jack Thomson joins our panel on top farm traits Pg. 11

+PLUS build an advisory team for your farm CROPS GUIDE ďƒ¨ Electric meters for your planter. They’re catching on fast Publications Mail Agreement Number 40069240

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Contents

february 17, 2015

BUSINESS 8

ciao bellissima!

Italy’s farms were failing. Today, more are on a solid business footing, with little government help. Here’s how they’re doing it.

16 team work

The Tilstras wanted a succession plan to strengthen their family, not jeopardize it. Now, their advisory-team strategy is helping.

20 food fight

Our associate editor Gord Gilmour talks to top Americans in the winner-take-all debate over the ethics of food production.

26 tipping point

It can seem the Americans supersize everything, including their farms, but there are signs the trend to big is slowing.

27 FINANCE METRICS — OPERATING EFFICIENCY

Run these numbers on your farm, with help from AME experts.

28 EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE

In industry at large, the proof is in. High CEO pay often leads to poor decision-making. What about on the farm?

30 WHO NEEDS EQUIPMENT?

Fiete Suhr crops 7,000 acres in Ontario with only a pickup truck and a cellphone. The rest is custom — and it pays.

34 MORE TO MARKETING THAN PRICE

When our Gerald Pilger set out to find who is marketing Canada, not just selling grain, he wasn’t impressed by what he found.

38 MANUFACTURING TALENT

Here’s how machinery makers are growing their own leaders.

46 Guide HR — doctor, give me some ritalin for my husband!

Entrepreneurs are at four times the risk of ADHD among adults.

48

PG. 11 Unleash your midas Touch Our panel of Jack Thomson, Jerry Bouma and Rob Saik talk to associate editor Maggie Van Camp about the common traits they see in top farmers. What emerges may be your checklist for improved farm performance.

g uide life — LIVING WITH DEMENTIA ON THE FARM

No one wants an Alzheimer’s diagnosis, but do see your doctor.

EVERY ISSUE 6 MACHINERY GUIDE

They don’t seed, spray or harvest, but these tools can boost your farm efficiency.

47 GUIDE HEALTH

Everybody gets a nosebleed. But when is it more serious?

50 HANSON ACRES

CROPS GUIDE 40 ELECTRIC METERING FOR YOUR PLANTER

Among the hottest new innovations for corn, these meters are catching on fast. The secret is out!

42 A COVER CROP THAT BUZZES

Phacelia opens new cover crop and rotation possibilities, and is a bee magnet with few rivals.

Dale takes his grandson to the rink. But that’s only half the story.

44 PEST PATROL

9 to 5 is the best time to kill weeds, writes OMAFRA’s Mike Cowbrough. Just watch that wind speed.

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february 17, 2015

country-guide.ca 3

desk EDITORIAL STAFF Editor: Tom Button 12827 Klondyke Line, Ridgetown, ON N0P 2C0 (519) 674-1449 Fax (519) 674-5229 Email: tom.button@fbcpublishing.com Associate Editors: Maggie Van Camp Fax (905) 986-9991 (905) 986-5342 Email: mvancamp@fbcpublishing.com Gord Gilmour (204) 453-7624 Cell: (204) 294-9195 Fax (204) 942-8463 Email: gord.gilmour@fbcpublishing.com Production Editor: Ralph Pearce (226) 448-4351 Email: ralph.pearce@fbcpublishing.com ADVERTISING SALES Lillie Ann Morris (905) 838-2826 Email: lamorris@xplornet.com Dan Kuchma Cell (204) 290-5419 (204) 944-5560 Email: dan.kuchma@fbcpublishing.com

Tom Button is editor of Country Guide magazine

The point of the telling I’m reminded of the old story of the preacher who learned a valuable trick very early in his career, although it was a trick that he thought was a bit unchurch-like and that he was careful never to reveal.

When he started his sermon each Sunday, this preacher would sneak his hand into his pocket for a cough drop, and discretely slide the cough drop under his tongue. That way, when the cough drop was finally gone, he knew it was time to wind up his sermon so everyone could get home just in time for lunch.

As tricks go, this one worked exceptionally well, except for that fateful last Sunday.

The preacher began his sermon as usual, but lunchtime came and lunchtime went, and then the afternoon came and the afternoon went, and even suppertime came and suppertime went, and still he kept talking.

And he talked and he talked until 9:07, when the congregation was suddenly awoken by a loud crash, and there lay the poor preacher, dead in the pulpit where he had talked until he had dropped in a heap.

It wasn’t until they got him to the undertaker’s that the quizzical discovery was made, for in the preacher’s pocket they found a cough mint, and in his mouth a button.

I know I should apologize for telling such a story, especially because it builds up such a great sense that somehow there’s some great insight or some powerful meaning at its core.

If there is a point to its telling, how4 country-guide.ca

ever, it’s only that you can get anyone to listen to almost anything if you put it inside a narrative. How else would I get you to listen to me talk about church life 75 or 100 years ago?

And it’s also that narratives are the way we understand the world.

In agriculture we’ve started to embrace the idea of looking at budgets as the narratives of our farms. In agriculture too, we see the arcs of each other’s careers in terms of family narrative.

But the secret behind the picture that associate editor Maggie Van Camp portrays so well in her story “Unleash your Midas touch,” is that today’s top farmers understand this better than any of the rest of us.

It’s a commonplace but it’s nevertheless true that if you can visualize where you want to go, you vastly increase your odds of getting there. And you increase those odds all that much more if you can articulate the story of how you can do it.

The stories of these farms are incredible, and I urge you to read Maggie’s story slowly, always looking for quotes that you can ruminate on through the day. Here’s just one, this time from Jerry Bouma when he is talking about how this next generation will prove to be a generation to watch. Says Jerry, “Their objectives are a lot bigger, grander than we ever could have imagined a decade ago.”

This issue of Country Guide is packed with stories. Are we getting it right? Let me know at tom.button@fbcpublishing.com.

Head Office: 1666 Dublin Ave., Winnipeg, MB R3H 0H1 (204) 944-5765 Fax (204) 944-5562 Advertising Services Co-ordinator: Sharon Komoski Fax (204) 944-5562 (204) 944-5758 Email: ads@fbcpublishing.com Designer: Jenelle Jensen Publisher: Lynda Tityk Email: lynda.tityk@fbcpublishing.com Associate Publisher/Editorial Director: John Morriss Email: john.morriss@fbcpublishing.com Production Director: Shawna Gibson Email: shawna@fbcpublishing.com Circulation Manager: Heather Anderson Email: heather@fbcpublishing.com President: Bob Willcox Glacier FarmMedia Email: bwillcox@farmmedia.com Contents of this publication are copyrighted and may be reproduced only with the permission of the editor. Country Guide, incorporating the Nor’West Farmer and Farm & Home, is published by Farm Business Communications. Head office: Winnipeg, Manitoba. Printed by Transcontinental LGMC. Country Guide is published 13 times per year by Farm Business Communications. Subscription rates in Canada — Farmer $41 for one year, $61 for 2 years, $87 for 3 years. (Prices include GST) U.S. subscription rate — $35 (U.S. funds). Subscription rate outside Canada and U.S. — $50 per year. Single copies: $3.50.

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Call toll-free 1-800-665-1362 or email: subscription@fbcpublishing.com U.S. subscribers call 1-204-944-5766 Country Guide is printed with linseed oil-based inks PRINTED IN CANADA Vol. 134 No. 3 Internet address: www.agcanada.com

ISSN 1915-8491 The editors and journalists who write, contribute and provide opinions to Country Guide and Farm Business Communications attempt to provide accurate and useful opinions, information and analysis. However, the editors, journalists, Country Guide and Farm Business Communications, cannot and do not guarantee the accuracy of the information contained in this publication and the editors as well as Country Guide and Farm Business Communications assume no responsibility for any actions or decisions taken by any reader for this publication based on any and all information provided.

february 17, 2015

THE ONTARIO AGROLOGIST A conversation with Lianne (Lia) Appleby P.Ag.,M.Sc., B.Sc. (Agr.), and Associate Editor with Annex Business Media based in Simcoe, Ontario.

Q: You’ve built quite an impressive

Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation. I

work and experience resume over

volunteer as Assistant Race Director for

slightly more than a decade. Can

the Annual Trillium Races every May

you give us just a brief synopsis

in Mount Forest, and I try to volunteer

of your career to date?

with the Canadian Warplane Heritage

Lia: Well, some would say that I came

Museum as much as possible.

into agriculture by accident. After being

And there’s my membership with the

told that policing was ‘too competitive’

OIA. I received my P.Ag. designation

plus a stroke of luck in my teen years,

back in 2008. I joined the OIA as

I landed a job in agricultural research.

an Articling Agrologist, shortly after

I went on to do my B.Sc. (Agr.) at the

graduating from university. I served

University of Guelph, then I completed

on the Board for four years, and I’m a

my Master’s in poultry nutrition.

former Vice-President with the Institute.

After graduation, a passion for writing,

Q: Why did you want to go

to continue to learn about the industry

a knowledge of poultry and also

after a P.Ag. accreditation?

so that the industry will keep growing.

knowing the right people landed me

Lia: Someone I have a lot of respect

a communications job with Chicken

And I think the OIA, through its

for had his P.Ag. designation. He

Farmers of Ontario. Then I moved

membership, can provide the Ag

convinced me to go after it. I was lucky

into public relations with the Ontario

industry with another supportive voice.

to have a former general manager

Cattlemen’s Association for 5 years. But

You tend to hear about problems in the

at Chicken Farmers of Ontario mentor

the poultry industry drew me back so

agriculture and agri-food sector like

me in my first job after graduation.

food recalls, animal welfare issues and

Q: What value do you think the

other things, so I think it’s important for

Ontario Institute of Agrologists bring

the people in this industry to stand up

to the industry and marketplace?

and say ‘look, we’re professionals, we’re

service support. Then in January

Lia: I think it’s a way to show there

ethical - and we’re doing our best to

2013, I got my dream job as an editor

is an organization that brings real

help bring healthy food to the table’.

with Annex Business Media and its

pride to the agricultural industry. The

Canadian Poultry Magazine. Last

OIA’s accreditation process gives you

year I accepted a broader role at as

something that you carry with you all

The Ontario Institute of Agrologists

the Digital Editor working with all of

the time. Your P.Ag, or T.Ag. or A.Ag.

represents nearly 500 Professional

the Annex agricultural publications.

designation allows you to show that, as

(P.Ag.), Technical (T.Ag.), and

an individual, what you ‘do for a living’

Articling (A.Ag.) Agrologist

is not just your day job where, at the

members across Ontario’s

end of the day you just go home and

diverse agricultural industry. The

forget about it until the next morning.

OIA is based in Guelph. For a

The accreditation proves to our peers,

to the Board of Farm & Food Care,

current listing of OIA Members,

to the industry and to the general public

Ontario, for a one-year term and

events and information go to

that we give effort back, and I think, at

I’m a former Director for the Eastern

the website shown below.

least I hope, that it challenges others

I moved to Hybrid Turkeys’ marketing department working on advertising campaigns, website coordination, corporate branding, sales and industry

Q: You’ve also had more than a few extra-curricular career activities, as well?

Lia: In the Spring of 2012 I was elected

www.oia.on.ca

Machinery

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

With spring on the horizon, Country Guide is providing a quick update on new equipment that doesn’t plant or harvest, or haul or spray. Even so, these are innovative designs that can prove just as valuable in the broader scope of all that’s happening on the farm these days. So have a look, and if you’re interested in learning more, check each manufacturer’s website included at the end of each entry and, as always, be ready to do your homework. It will pay.

Bobcat S450 Skid-Steer Loader  Billed by the company as “one tough animal,” the new Bobcat S450 skid-steer loader pledges to improve performance with a nondiesel particulate filter (DPF) engine that nicely complements a narrower width (under five feet) and a 20 per cent boost in auxiliary hydraulic pressures. With its 49-horsepower engine and enhanced capabilities, it’s easy to see why the S450 is replacing the K-Series S130: there’s just more the S450 can do on the farm. Not only that,

6 country-guide.ca

but operators won’t need to spend that time cleaning or replacing the filter or engaging in the regeneration process — and the engine still conforms to the Tier 4 emissions standards. Among its other attributes, the S450 comes with a low operating weight and a better reach, whether you need to load and unload items or materials, or move that soil back in against a foundation. There’s even an optional two-speed drive, capable of 10.4 kph (6.5 m.p.h.) in the low range and nearly 15 kph (9.2 m.p.h.) on high.

www.bobcat.com

February 17, 2015

Sunflower (AGCO) 6631 Series Vertical Tillage System  With corn yields now well above 200 bu./ac. in many parts of Canada, there’s growing concern about the amount of residue left on fields by that high-density, high-intensity management. Sunflower Manufacturing, part of AGCO, offers up a durable vertical tillage unit capable of managing heavy residues. The 6631 series boasts seven new models, in widths from 20 feet, five inches to 34 feet, nine inches. Featured at the 2014

Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show, the 6631 series combines its exclusive Saber Blade disc blades with a staggered offset disc configuration which enables the unit to easily slice through heavy corn residues, cutting them down to size and knifing them into the soil. For farmers with uneven fields, the 6631 series maintains Sunflower’s unique design, with 22 degrees of wing flex (10 up and 12 down) meaning better, more uniform coverage. The frame is also longer, enhancing the system’s ability to do everything it’s supposed to — without clogging.

www.sunflowermfg.com

Yetter 5000 Stalk Devastator 

Brandt 16HP Swing Away Auger

It’s one thing to have an aggressive implement that can knock down those corn stalks, but it means even more when it’s adaptable to as many as 10 different combines. That’s the advantage that Yetter brings to the field with its 5000 Stalk Devastator, originally launched in 2012, but now capable of fitting more corn heads. The corn stalks on today’s hybrids are more durable than ever, and can be a real threat to tire life. But the Yetter 5000 Stalk Devastator bends, pushes and breaks the stalks, allowing tires and tracks to roll over them with less damage. Quick and easy to install, the Devastator can work on Case IH eight-row combines, John Deere 16-row corn heads, Gleaner and Gleaner Hugger, Massey-Ferguson and Challenger six- and eight-row heads and Claas/Lexion eight- and 12-row corn heads. It also fits on Drago and Geringhoff folding corn heads.

Brandt’s new 16HP Swing Away auger will be available for the 2015 growing season. With lengths of 85, 105 and 125 feet, this new model can handle up to 23,000 bushels per hour, the company says.

At 16 inches in diameter, this auger has the power and capacity to empty a Super-B trailer in just minutes. That means the trucks can spend more time doing what they should be doing — moving grain, not waiting to unload. The 16-horsepower auger comes with a reversible 1,000-rpm gearbox and a constant velocity PTO, so it can handle the pressure of a busy harvest and large volumes of grain — and do it fast. With its square connections, a four-inch core and a chain coupler, there’s also less stress on the components, meaning longer, smoother and more durable performance.

www.brandt.ca

www.yetterco.com February 17, 2015

country-guide.ca 7

business

Ciao bellissima!

Italy’s tiny farms are clinging to life as tenaciously as they cling to their hillsides. Now it appears they may have found their road to success

By Marianne Stamm he road to the farm called I Cianelli runs out of the seaside resort of Andora, Italy, through the basil fields behind it. Narrow at first, the road curves up the stony hillside to a ledge overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, for it is here, from an impressive limestone house surrounded by native brush and olive groves, that Stefano Trevia and Rosanna Baggetta operate their small farm and agritourism business.

At just under nine acres, I Cianelli is among the 73 per cent of Italy’s farms that are under 12.5 acres.

Only five per cent of Italian farms are over 75 acres, although together they account for over half of the country’s nearly 20 million arable acres. Most of those larger farms, however, are in the Po Plain in the north, producing rice, wheat, corn and sugar beets.

The rest of Italy consists largely of hills and mountains, but it is here that Italy’s famous wines and olive oil are grown, plus tomatoes and other vegetables and fruit.

8 country-guide.ca

Liguria itself is a narrow strip of mostly sparse and stony pine, oak and chestnuts hills that fall steeply into the sea. Every small bay hosts a coastal resort town, among them such better-known destinations as San Remo or Savona. Except for these towns, it’s wild country, not prime farming by any description, except for the small plain behind Albenga where greenhouses cover the landscape with a flourishing floriculture.

The western section of Liguria is home to a much smaller plain centred around Andora on what is called the Italian Riviera, and it is here that, according to locals, the basil for the world’s best pesto is grown. Beyond that plain, however, the remaining farms hug the steep hillsides, terraced and planted with mostly olive groves and a few vineyards.

This is the home of I Cianelli, a farm that takes its name from the dialect word for the extra-wide terraces unique to that area.

Stefano and Rosanna came to farming late. In 2007, in their early 40s, they left their comfortable

February 17, 2015

business

With views of the Mediterranean, I Cianelli finds a way to value add with its stony ground. jobs as auto mechanic and gym instructor and took over Stefano’s father’s farm.

Had they not, I Cianelli might have given up, as one-third of Italy’s farms did between the years 2000 and 2010.

Coming to the farm was a risk — Rosanna and Stefano knew the land base wasn’t enough to pay their bills. But, they thought, “Let’s try it.” The government was offering incentives for agritourism — holidays on the farm. With that help they built a new house with room for 12 guests, offering breakfast and a full dinner of traditional Ligurian food cooked to perfection by Rosanna.

The small vineyard produces 1,000 bottles of wine annually of the local Pigato grape. Most of the farm is in olive groves, about 1,000 trees in groups of 100 to 200 trees, and 200 fruit trees including cherry, peach, apricot, pear and apples.

Stefano works full time on the farm where he is responsible for all the cropping. Rosanna’s job is to look after the guests, especially the kitchen, although during the quiet winter season she continues to work as a gym instructor in Andora.

Ligurian olive oil, produced from the Taggiasche olive, has a good reputation.

The oil is lighter, with a milder flavour than that of southern Italy, and is wonderful with fish dishes. 2014 was a poor year for olive production. The last two years were too wet, unusual for this norFebruary 17, 2015

mally arid region. It rained during flowering, reducing pollination.

Recently an Asian pest has been troubling them too — the olive fly, which lays eggs in unripe olive fruits. Stefano opens a shrivelled black olive exposing a tiny white larva. “In this last year the olive harvest was terrible,” he says. “I only got 170 litres of oil.”

At 10 euros (C$14) for a one-litre bottle, that’s not much return on a year’s work, he knows. Normally the total would be around 1,000 bottles.

Stefano prefers organic pest control, even though he’s not a certified organic farmer. Depending on the weather, he’ll treat the olive trees with up to two applications of insecticide. He’s researching an organic solution for the olive fly with kaolin, a white clay, but it washes off with rain, and is quite expensive. Another option is the Dow AgroSciences product “Spintor Fly” which is mixed with water in bottles and hung in the trees as traps.

Small farms survive by offering a premium product to customers with whom they have a close relationship. Stefano is particular about the processing of his crops. The friend who processes his olives owns an old stone press but also a modern one that can manage the temperature very precisely. Olives should be pressed at a low temperature for best quality — preferably 17 C but not more than 30 C. They need to be pressed within 24 hours

Rosanna welcomes guests who come to linger over I Cianelli’s homegrown food and wine. of picking, faster is better, to reduce the chance of fruit overheating or fermenting. Particular care must be taken with hygiene to produce a premium oil without a trace of rancidity, which can happen if equipment is not kept absolutely clean.

I Cianelli’s grapes are pressed in the wine cellar of a friend in Imperia, a nearby town. It’s these relationships, knowing those who will do the best job, that are so important to Stefano.

The olives and grapes thrive in the arid climate, but the fruit trees are irrigated. I Cianelli’s small well cannot keep up with the water necessary so Stefano supplements it with a rainwater pool.

The house is supplied with council water from an aqueduct.

It’s the agritourism which pays over half the bills. Passionate about their business, Rosanna and Stefano have built up a name. I Cianelli is open year round, and summers are always totally booked out. Breakfast, a wonderful affair with Rosanna’s whole wheat bread, jam from the fruit trees, local cheeses and a Moka pot of thick black Italian coffee with hot milk, is served on the patio with its lovely view over Andora’s hills and the Mediterranean Sea beyond. Dinner is taken at the large oak table inside.

Only environmentally friendly materials were utilized in the construction of the Continued on page 10 country-guide.ca 9

business

At just under nine acres, I Cianelli is an average-size farm, worked mainly by hand.

Continued from page 9 house. The plaster is of natural hydraulic lime with no trace of cement. Woodwork and furnishings are of solid oak. Rosanna takes care to source and use local organically grown products whenever possible, such as the wheat for her whole wheat bread and foccacia, and the cheeses for breakfast. The majority of vegetables come from her parents’ garden.

The European Union’s support for agritourism is part of a strategy to halt the exodus of youth from the farms.

Unemployment for youth under 25 in the Andora region, which is heavily dependent on tourism, was at an alarming 47 per cent in October 2014 and the national average wasn’t all that much better. The EU programs are geared to younger farmers in poorer rural regions, like Liguria.

Through agritourism, value is added to farm produce by serving it as meals or processing into oil, wine or jams sold to the guests.

Even so, to qualify for the agritourism label, farmers must spend more hours working on the farm than on tourism. Food must also originate primarily from on-farm produce or local sources, and traditional culture and food must be promoted.

The concept took hold quickly among Italians, for whom foods cooked with local products have long been highly valued. Food for Italians is not just about eating — it is about relationships, both to the people sharing the food and to those growing and marketing it.

These relationships are on display at 10 country-guide.ca

“ This past harvest was terrible,” Stefano says. “I got only 140 litres of (olive) oil.” At C$14 per litre, he knows they need the inn the local market where housewives seek only the best-quality products. It’s also on display when guests eat at I Cianelli. Dinner is not to be quickly eaten at Rosanna’s.

It’s a leisurely affair prepared with love, beginning with an antipasto, followed by the primo and second courses enhanced by a glass of I Cianelli’s wine. The meal ends with dessert, maybe Rosanna’s olive cake dipped in Limoncello. By now everyone is too full and it’s too late to drive the curves down to Andora’s nightlife!

Now, Rosanna and Stefano are evolving toward a vegetarian menu, although it will still incorporate eggs and cheese, with fish and meat reserved for specific events. This change, along with I Cianelli’s concern for the environment and the warm hospitality of its owners, provides the agritourisimo with a strong advantage.

Rosanna offers personal fitness lessons and Stefano mountain bike tours. Both are eager to recommend hiking and biking trails off the beaten path, plus day trips to one of the borgos (villages) tucked into the

hills, such as the medieval town of Zuccarello, or Castelvecchio di Rocca Barbena crowning the top of the mountain.

Their 20-year-old son Simone is home for a year. He studied accounting but has plans to become a chef, the kitchen being his passion. Stefano and Rosanna hope he will take over the farm. There is room to grow — land is available next door.

Stefano would expand the vineyard and add a processing and bottling plant. He talks of greenhouses for vegetables. But he’s 50 now, and unless he knows Simone will come back to the farm, he’s not willing to work harder than he already does.

The steep hills leave little room for machinery. Most of the work is hand labour — weeds are controlled with the string trimmer or rototiller. The olive trees and grapes are pruned by hand.

Not all of the 1,000 trees get pruned every year. Stefano is fit — he’s an avid mountain biker. But it’s still hard work.

Their marketing could be improved, Stefano admits. “Ligurians don’t market themselves well.” He says they are not as aggressive as the people in the Tuscany, who advertise in the newspapers and on the Internet. Rosanna says Ligurians are more reserved. She thinks it comes from their past, when Ligurians were continually attacked by pirates and armies. They learned to retreat, to say nothing, although they are very friendly when spoken to.

“It was a big change for me,” Stefano says of becoming a farmer. For 25 years he was used to waking early and going to work. One big challenge for him was the winter, especially the rainy days when he couldn’t go outside. Now he’s adjusted. “The lifestyle is far more relaxed and rewarding,” he says. The income is not as secure or as high, “but it is worth it.” Rosanna loves the farm and particularly enjoys the agritourisimo. “The guests become friends,” she says. “They send emails: ‘Ciao, Rosanna,’ they write in English, French, Spanish and Italian.”

Stefano and Rosanna are aware that their business depends heavily on tourism. Subsidies don’t contribute much to their income. Italy’s volatile economic and political situation worries them, but they hope to increasingly draw foreign tourists too. “I hope the economic crisis will be better the next year,” says Stefano, noting that next October they will build a swimming pool and add two more rooms. “I want to survive.” CG February 17, 2015

business

Unleash your Midas touch Adopt these seven habits of Canada’s top farmers

By Maggie Van Camp, CG Associate Editor Does it seem some farmers just have that touch? Anything they start turns into gold. Is it just timing?

Genius? Luck? Or do these farmers regularly do things that enable them to excel? Or do they cultivate skills that the rest of us don’t?

Country Guide asked Jack Thomson, president of the Outstanding Young Farmer organization, Rob Saik, CEO of The Agri-Trend Group, and Jerry Bouma of Toma & Bouma Management Consultants to share their insights on the things that top modern farmers do that explain why they’re ahead of the pack.

Their list of seven top practices gives us a peek into a future where attitudes and aptitudes will come together to drive farm success as never before.

1. Start every day with positive attitude

2. Plan, think and act like a CEO

These days, the stars are just starting to make way for the sun to rise when Jack Thomson from Antigonish, Nova Scotia comes in for breakfast. He milks 120 cows starting at 3:30 a.m. so he can share breakfast with his four children, and so they can also have their evenings together.

Despite the schedule, Thomson’s energy and enthusiasm vibrate through the telephone when he talks about the common denominators he sees in the participants in Outstanding Young Farmers (OYF).

OYF nominees come from across the country and from all sectors, but what Thomson sees in all of them is positive attitude. “They are passionate, and driven not just by profits but also by something more,” Thomson says. “They want to make a difference, to make things better for their businesses, for their families and for their communities.”

“They wake up and they go to bed always in this right state of mind,” Thomson says. “If the situation is not so good, then they turn it into an opportunity.”

Thomson knows about surviving challenges. In 2007, right after they had just finished remodelling their barn and had remortgaged to do it, lightning struck and the resulting fire consumed everything, except 80 cows. And no… they hadn’t yet put into place insurance for the remodelling.

They started over, slowly rebuilding the 120-cow milking herd, West River Holsteins. Then, three months later, an electrical fire destroyed their home, right before Christmas.

“You are going to run into a challenge in this business,” Thomson says. “If you are not optimistic, you are not going to make it.”

Top farmers today focus on strategy and on their goals, and on ensuring the resources are in place to achieve these goals, says Jerry Bouma. In 2005, Bouma and his partner wrote a summary of research called Best Management Practices of Leading Farmers. The 158 leading farmers they interviewed in Western Canada were fundamentally good managers and were market focused.

The top farmers today are still good managers, and they understand marketing and risk, but today’s leading farmer is more process oriented.

“They set the direction of the farm but they also develop ways to achieve their goals,” Bouma says. “These gifted managers have a systematic approach.”

They build or access systems, including agronomic information and custom services. They’re strong on planning and strategy, but they’re also strong at finding people to do the production work and at setting production plans. For example, to manage risk, they have marketing plans and hedging strategies. These producers set expected margins, and from there, they create clear plans to make it happen.

Today’s younger successful farmers are more likely to come to their work thinking about business strategy and business principles, says Bouma.

And, says Bouma, this is going to be a generation to watch. “Their objectives are a lot bigger, grander than we ever could have imagined a decade ago.”

Bouma also says that two very diverse systems are currently operating in farming, with small intense producers focused on local food production

February 17, 2015

Continued on page 14 country-guide.ca 11

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business

Continued from page 11 and larger commercial crop and livestock farms. Yet both require CEO-type of leadership.

When Rob Saik, CEO of The AgriTrend Group, works with top grain and oilseed farmers, he finds they have short- and long-term plans for their farms and for themselves. These plans are written down, and the plans give the farmers confidence in their decision-making, in addition to giving their bankers more confidence too.

“They plan where they want to go, and they set strategies using outside help,” says Saik.

This is more involved than writing mission and vision statements. It’s setting financial goals and developing specific projects and production plans.

14 country-guide.ca

Importantly, says Saik, these farmers also co-ordinate complex businesses by preplanning for potential hiccups, threats and growth opportunities.

This is thinking like a CEO.

3. Have a new set of boundaries Today’s top farmers have burst through the traditional physical boundaries of farming and have a whole new view of the limits of their farm, beyond geography.

In the past, farmers were very spatially bound, but that’s simply no longer the case, says Bouma. It’s not unusual now for the CEO farmer to be farming lands or raising livestock across a wide geographical area.

It used to be 3,000 or 5,000 acres was a big grain farm. Today some farmers work 10,000, 15,000 or 30,000

acres. To do it at that scale, they rent the land, they lease equipment, they hire staff and custom work, says Bouma.

However, it isn’t just the scale of the farm. It’s their approach to resources.

These farmers have worldwide connections at their fingertips for everything from production to marketing, and they leverage those connections. For example, they text an engineer in Ireland about how a TMR mixer works.

But perhaps most importantly, they also have a new way of looking at their assets. Low interest rates and more aggressive leveraging have stretched their financial boundaries, says Bouma. The limitation is what can you obtain — what you can rent, lease or buy.

The boundary is no longer what your bank will lend you.

“Farms today can be operated under February 17, 2015

Photography: john david photography

For OYF president Jack Thomson, the key is to understand risk.

“I’d rather be stabbed in the front than in the back.”

business totally new boundaries — or, perhaps more accurately, the lack of boundaries,” says Bouma.

And they have their eyes on the future. With so many Canadian farmers in their 70s, huge numbers of deals are going to go down in the near term, says Saik. “Very large farms of 30,000 acres are going to be able to move to 50,000 acres fairly quickly.”

4. Network, network, network Today’s top farmers network with other CEOs from other farms and other businesses. Their diversified networks help them understand how to expand and how to find financing. “This is not about size, this is the ability to accept knowledge and put it into motion,” says Saik. “They (top farmers) seek a lot of outside help and are not scared to put it into play.”

The top farms today are more complicated and bigger, so farmers recognize they can’t do it all. Over the years, Saik has seen that top farmers know how to hire good people.

Saik was packing his suitcase while talking with Country Guide on his everbuzzing cellphone. This guy’s the definition of busy. However, he is never too busy to learn, and every 90 days for the last 21 years he has hopped on a plane to attend a workshop on business strategies. He’s the only aggie in the room, and he invariably learns from the other participants.

More farmers are adopting similar strategies. It’s all about being open to learning. Saik describes today’s top farmers as being “coachable” and says the ability and desire to learn is what divides the top third of farmers from the lower two-thirds.

For Jack Thomson, one of the benefits of being involved with OYF is interacting with the nominees. Consistently, they’re intelligent, they’re never afraid to ask questions, and they are open thinkers.

A side benefit to this sharing of ideas is that it’s extremely motivational. In the decade since Thomson and his wife, Rhonda MacDougall, won OYF nationally, they’ve stayed connected to the group because of the energy and inspiration of the other participants.

“Not only are they good business people, they have compassion and understanding,” says Thomson. “We (OYFs) all care. That’s what binds us.”

The need for networking goes beyond the farm gate and social time. Top farmers are deeply connected to their marFebruary 17, 2015

kets, adds Thomson. With help from their networks, they gain insights into the markets and their trends.

5. Understand risk “If something’s going to go wrong, I’d rather be stabbed in the front than in the back,” says Thomson. “At least then, you can see it coming.” Although open to new ideas, top farmers look hard at whether their finances and management can handle it.

Generally, younger people have a greater appetite for risk than older ones.

Even though the OYF nominees are brimming with optimism and passion, they measure what difference any change is going to make, and they understand that it’s got to be beneficial for their life and the family and not just financial.

Part of making good choices is understanding risk, says Thomson. You have to believe in your decisions and not be consumed by the potential of mistakes.

“Risk is what you can’t control,” he says.

“And you just try to mitigate exposure to those factors.”

6. Experiment Saik sees farms moving toward formalizing research. With variable-rate technology it’s possible to do strip trials in live field conditions. Yield monitors and well-designed strip trials allow for statistically significant data results. These long skinny strips can be revolutionary, says Saik.

Besides, farmers can claim their research and development budgets through SNRD credits.

“There’s no better data set for a farmer than what happens on their own farm,” says Saik. “These are ground truths.”

7. Use big data effectively Many of today’s leading-edge farmers are taking data use to the next level, says Saik.

They use and integrate the data they collect, linking production and financial.

This information needs to move seamlessly between growing the crop, selling the crop and managing the farm business.

Historically, we had very disparate information from yield monitors to elevators to grain-trading companies to personal accounting programs.

Some of today’s top farms have a way to hook all their production information together in one place so they’re able to

Rob Saik, CEO of The Agri-Trend Group.

“ This is not about size,” Saik says. “This is the ability to accept knowledge and put it in motion.” see their whole farm. “Data is the largest opportunity for farmers,” says Saik.

As farmers gather more data years for their farms, their decision-making become more accurate, says Saik. Eventually they can make production decisions based on this data on the fly, and to do that, he believes it’s imperative that farmers should own and control their own data.

Back on the farm, Thomson isn’t fazed by the onset and integration of technology. In the last 10 years, the flow of information has sped up and it has become important for farmers to learn how to sift through and manage it.

Access to information is also mobile, so Thomson can stay connected. But that means he can also get sidetracked by data. “Farmers are farmers for God’s sake, and you can get too much information so you end up churning in it and it turns into nothing,” says Thomson.

The important thing, Thomson finds, is to remember the purpose of information — to keep improving.

“Top farmers in my father’s time — and now — know what they are looking for,” says Thomson. “They have the goals of trying to be the best farmers we can be, to be involved in the community, to make it a better place.” CG country-guide.ca 15

business

hen Ted Tilstra imagined his retirement, he knew that he wanted it to continue to include having a coffee around the kitchen table with his brother and nephews.

Tilstra Bros. have been running their parents’ dairy farm in Dunnville, Ont., for nearly 25 years.

Together Don and Ted are milking 100 purebred Holstein cattle and have often been scoring among their county’s top 10 dairy herd managers. With their wives contributing by working out and their kids amicably involved in the farm’s routine, it’s a picture of family harmony now and into the future.

But Don and Ted have been around long enough to be wary anyway.

“You see so many farms and farm families trying to make the transition, where the wheels fell out of the family affair trying to make the transition, and where they won’t talk to each other anymore,” Ted says.

So when Len Davies of Davies Legacy Planning Group stood up two years ago to talk about multidisciplinary advising at a workshop in Vineland, Ont., the Tilstra family was listening. “If you’re in a farming operation, you use your accountant, feed nutritionist, vet service, and agronomist,” Davies reasoned. “You’ve got to use people who look at your business with a different perspective than you.”

For the Tilstras, it was a process at first to hire a succession planner, but in addition to hearing from Davies in Vineland, two of Don’s sons had also heard him speak while they were attending Ridgetown College. Then there was Ted and Karen’s own son, who was starting to show a keen interest in farming himself. “Over time, we’ve watched the kids, where their interests are, how they’re educating themselves, integrating themselves into the farming community, and they want to farm,” Karen says. “So it’s become important to us that we get them started reasonably young, when they have lots of energy to work hard, because it’s a long haul.”

The whole Tilstra family agreed to meet with Davies in the early spring of 2014 to start talking about how Don, Jeanette, and their three boys might possibly farm with Ted and his son, and if they should be shopping for neighbouring dairy barns, or

16 country-guide.ca

By Amy Petherick building another facility completely and splitting the milk quota the farm already had.

“I think you need to feel connected to the person you choose, and we felt connected to Len,” Karen says, “and we liked the idea of multi-involvement from everybody.” It wasn’t long before the whole family was sitting down at a table, working out the early stages of a big plan, with Davies, their lender Derek Emond, and accountant, Connor Keuning, all weighing in as they went along.

Making it work While graduating in 2013 from the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia, Davies was introduced to the concept of multidisciplinary advising, which advocates having all of a family business’s key professional advisers work together in planning activities.

The concept wasn’t developed for agriculture, but Davies, a member of the Canadian Association of Farm Advisors, immediately sensed a potential fit. Having worked in the farm community for over 45 years, he’s seen how complex the business has become, and he believes team advising produces the best possible results.

“You’ve got the synergies of the team working for you,” Davies says. “Individually, advisers may not think of everything, but as a team, one says something that gets another one thinking.”

Davies says his role is to “quarterback” the efforts of the team and ensure everyone assembled plays well together.

“You can have a very smart accountant who is going to sit there and say nothing, but that’s no good to you on a team,” Davies says as an example. So he uses his best discretion to either work with the advisers his farm clients have a history with already, or they call in additional team players who will strengthen any team weaknesses.

When assembling these teams, Davies says there really are a number of qualities to look for. “You’ve got to be an out-of-the-box thinker,” he says.

“You’ve got to be able to look ahead at where the industry’s going, to be a kind of a futurist. You’ve got to express yourself. And you’ve got to leave your ego at the door.”

Fortunately, by all accounts, ego isn’t an issue

February 17, 2015

Photography: DEW Imagery

Team work

Getting their advisers to meet and work together as a team is helping drive the Tilstras’ succession planning

business

with the team working for the Tilstra family. Keuning tells me that he’s had the opportunity to work with Davies before and still hasn’t experienced a case where one adviser decided to be a hero. In the Tilstra case, he welcomes the opportunity to work closely with their lender rather than shy away from someone who may question his financial statements. Instead, he finds it feeds his ideas.

“You just have more brain power working for you, coming from different angles,” Keuning says.

For instance, if Keuning asks a question like: “What is the maximum loan this operation could get on quota?”

Emond, as a lender from Farm Credit Canada, can immediately answer them because he’s on top of that discipline.

Adds Keuning: “Bankers also have other analytical skills that are constantly being updated and they know about policies that change all the time, so I think it’s good to have an individual like that on board.”

As long as there’s mutual respect between the professionals at the table, Keuning believes the approach is very effective.

Similarly Emond, who has been the Tilstras’ lender for 18 years now and is very familiar with Keuning’s work, appreciates sharing the table with the farm accountant. “I find now, because so many families are incorporating or doing different structures or implementing new creative ideas, I don’t like to make a move without talking to the accountant first,” he says.

Sometimes logistics prevent face-toface meetings at the kitchen table, but technology makes it easy to copy in the whole team. The beauty of all this transparency, Emond tells me, is that the clients always know what’s going on and there are no surprises. Davies and Keuning know exactly what he’s doing, Emond adds, “so if they see something wrong, I’m hoping they poke a hole in it and say, ‘Derek, you can’t do that,’ or, ‘Derek, this doesn’t make sense from our end.’”

But when everyone does get together at the table, they all come prepared. “I come in with the cash flows, Len’s doing

For Ted (l) and Don Tilstra, building an advisory team was key to their goal of creating a harmonious, smart succession plan that works for the whole family.

February 17, 2015

Continued on page 18

country-guide.ca 17

business

Critical to the success of the advisory team is that it kept final control squarely in the hands of Ted and Karen (l) and Don and Jeanette.

Continued from page 17 the family dynamics side of things, and Connor’s looking at this from a tax perspective,” Emond says. “We each have our own expertise and we respect that.”

The farmer in charge Davies says this sort of role definition is critical to making the team atmosphere work. His job is also to maintain sight of the fact that at the end of the day, the Tilstras are the ones in charge here. “I make it quite clear that the advisers throw the stuff out, but you as the manager get to choose what you want to do.”

It’s the job of the advisers to look for any holes in the plan, as well as to suggest better ways to achieve the farm family’s objectives, and also to explain overall how the plan could be implemented.

For the Tilstras, it was important to outline the goal, making it clear that they wanted to be able to start the next generation off in a way that would keep everyone still happy to see one another at Christmas. That in turn soon led to a plan for Ted to cash out some of his shares in the dairy business so he and Karen could build a house and chicken barn to get their son started in broilers.

The suggestion that the brothers’ cur18 country-guide.ca

rent operation could afford that much additional debt, without cash-strapping the existing business, became a real eureka moment for all of the family, and came directly out of a meeting with the advisory team. Emond says it was a contribution he was really proud to make.

“There’s nothing personal in this for me other than seeing these people I really like succeed,” Emond says.

“They recognize each other’s strengths and weaknesses, they each have their own specialty on the farm, and they’re very courteous to one another, whether it comes down to allowing one another to take vacation time, or do their own stuff separately, but they really respect each other.”

Keuning says he has observed much the same, and although this succession isn’t complete, he’s very optimistic about it. He looks forward to one of the final tests to the plan they’re generating, which is when the Tilstras present everything for legal preparation.

“I’ve not been in a case where there was a lawyer in place early on, but I find they work as a sober second thought,” Keuning says. “They come in at the end and put it together, and do a lot of double-checking on things.” Because their area of expertise is so different from the other advisers on the team, he expects

any lawyer who’s on the ball will have some more good suggestions.

Ted assures me the Tilstra succession plan is far from complete, so their story is far from over. They are, after all, only a handful of months into what Davies tells me is a multi-year process with an incoming generation that’s still in school or only recently graduated.

But this is largely contributing to the family’s conviction that Davies’ multidisciplinary approach was the best decision they could have made.

“Len knows how to pull what he wants from the kids,” Ted chuckles.

“You don’t have the knowledge to ask the questions the way he would to get the answers about their expectations and where they want to be.”

Karen is quick to agree. “I’ve been in business all my life, and Len just had that next level of understanding about business and farming,” she says.

When they started, they had no idea that the process would be leading them away from the dairy business, would see them potentially move off of the family farm, and what’s more, be comfortable with that prospect. They couldn’t have asked for more though, especially looking forward to the day Ted sits down to have a laugh about it all, over coffee, with his brother and farming nephews. CG February 17, 2015

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business

Food fight Your business could soon be caught up in a public relations battle. Based on what we’re seeing south of the border, are you ready?

By Gord Gilmour, CG Associate Editor

tsunami seems set to wash over Canadian agriculture. No, the seas haven’t suddenly shifted inland. This dangerous wave is made up of public sentiment about the way you conduct your business.

Just like a tsunami, you might not like it, you probably won’t welcome it, but trying to resist it is going to be futile.

Anyone who wants evidence of what’s coming only has to take a look at our neighbours to the south. Over the past few years, the U.S. food industry has found itself under the microscope like never before.

From a push for GMO labelling to calls for the end to “factory-farmed” livestock, the old way of doing business is under siege.

Suddenly, bestselling books are deconstructing meals. Entire television channels stoke a “foodie” culture. And New York Times opinion makers are writing about the evils of antibiotic abuse in largescale livestock operations.

Plus, of course, there are those hidden-camera videos that go viral from inside livestock facilities, highlighting alleged abuse.

Canada isn’t there yet. So far nobody’s using their bully pulpit in the Globe and Mail to regularly beat up farmers — but there is a growing list of American farmers who are more than ready to tell us, based on their experience, that we’d be fools to think we aren’t on the same path.

A&W is suddenly promising their customers hormone-free beef in their burgers. The Canadian egg industry is rapidly moving toward an enriched housing model, spurred on by their customers in the fast-food sector who don’t want to be accused of bundling animal cruelty up into that breakfast sandwich. Plus, P.E.I. residents are watching pesticide applications on the island like a hawk. Some of the first “undercover” animal videos have hit the airwaves. The list goes on.

Can Canada’s farmers do anything about this?

20 country-guide.ca

Should they even try? To answer those questions, Country Guide recently spoke to Americans on both sides of the chasm about why they feel the way they do, whether common ground is possible and what the future might hold.

Good neighbor On paper, George Zittel should be farming in the middle of a war zone.

Zittel is a fifth-generation farmer mainly growing vegetables both in the field and in greenhouses, and he’s one of about 300 farm families in a 25-square-mile chunk of upstate New York that’s traditionally been an agriculture centre. That number includes a significant contingent of dairy farmers, so it sounds like a pictureperfect American idyll.

Except these days, Eden, N.Y. has become a bedroom community populated by about 8,000 urbanites who work in the city of Buffalo, just 20 minutes down the road.

It definitely sets the stage for a life full of conflict.

But an unexpected thing has happened. Zittel and other farmers embraced the growth of their local town. They got active in everything from the local volunteer fire department to the chamber of commerce, and they got elected to the town board.

They were determined to fly the agriculture flag.

Zittel says by doing so, he and other producers in the area have managed to prevent the emergence of an us-versus-them mentality on either side. And while he freely admits it’s far from perfect, he insists that by doing so, he’s become not “that farmer down the road” to his neighbours, but instead is a real person named George, someone they pick the phone up and call if they’ve got an issue or concern.

In an era of heightened activist interest in food and farming, that relationship may even eventually serve as their first line of defence if outsiders decide to try to stir up trouble, he says.

February 17, 2015

business

“I really do think that if someone from outside began to attack us, they would defend us,” Zittel says of his neighbours.

“As a town board, we’ve done a lot of work, everything from surveys to setting up an agricultural board, and we know they like having farming around, they like to see it, they like that connection to it, even if it’s just driving by the fields and seeing the crops.”

Zittel says there are two key elements to the defence of farming in this challenging environment. One is a potent right-tofarm law, that clearly delineates just what farmers can and cannot do. In the case of New York state, those limitations are very clear-cut, Zittel says.

“There are two things it has the power to stop — if there’s a health issue or a safety issue,” Zittel says. “If it’s just a bit of dust or noise, or the inconvenience of slow-moving equipment, they legally can’t stop us.”

That’s the stick the local agriculture industry holds, but Zittel cautions the industry won’t get far just swatting people with it. After all, it only exists because politicians — and by extension voters — have granted it. Elections still happen, politicians can get fired by voters, and if agriculture plays it too cute, it could find itself losing its most potent defence. This is where the carrot comes in, Zittel says. It’s in actually listening to complainants, rather than simply dismissing their concerns.

The farm strategy was to build bridges.

“We set up an agriculture committee for the town, and when there’s a problem, it’s their job to go out, talk to the people involved, and try to resolve the issue,” Zittel says. “The people on this board are farmers themselves, but it’s important that they take these concerns seriously. We can’t just give them lip service.”

Frequently the issues aren’t all that challenging, and the solution actually comes from a bit of dialogue between both parties.

A neighbour might not object to manure spreading from a dairy operation, for example, but just not want it to happen right before the big picnic they’re planning on Sunday afternoon.

When solutions aren’t possible, the issue goes before the town council, and this is where the right-to-farm law comes in. But that’s a last resort.

“We encourage our neighbours to communicate with us, to tell us about things like a picnic they have planned,” Zittel says.

February 17, 2015

The activist

Matt Rice, director of investigations, Mercy For Animals.

For many in the agriculture industry, Matt Rice could be a poster boy for all their objections about animal activists.

He’s director of investigations for Mercy For Animals, the activist group perhaps best known for going undercover at animal agriculture operations to shoot hidden-camera footage of animal abuse.

Rice is an urbanite who lives and works in Los Angeles, with an office on the famed Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood. He and the organization he works for aren’t shy about harnessing the star power of nearby Hollywood to push their viewpoint. He’s even a vegan.

What he doesn’t have are horns and a tail, and anyone who’s expecting a scatterbrained hippie is going to be sorely disappointed. He’s also a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, and he marshals both passion and logic when the topic of animal agriculture comes up, saying it would be a mistake to simply brush him and others like him off as irrational radicals, especially since most of them used to be customers of the industry.

“The truth of the matter is that most of us used to eat meat and eggs, and enjoy them,” Rice told Country Guide during a recent conversation. “It was only after we encountered information about how they were being raised that most of us made the conscious decision not to consume them, because we didn’t feel we could morally support how it was being done.”

There’s little doubt Rice and others like him aren’t popular in the agriculture industry, garnering everything from straight-up criticism for presenting brief seconds-long video snippets out of context, to a push for tough “ag-gag” laws that make their tactics illegal. Despite this, however, Rice says the industry is likely to find itself on the losing side of history if it continues its current tactics of wrapping itself in the image of the kindly, stereotypical farmer in overalls when they’re in public, but then treat livestock as nothing more than cogs in a machine when they’re in the barn.

Rice paints a picture of a business that’s so convinced it and it alone is right, it won’t even take the time to bother to listen to its critics, preferring instead to “educate” the public rather than engage it in a constructive dialogue.

This, Rice says, is a crucial error, especially since the reality on the farm is so far removed from the perception most Americans have in their minds — a perception that the agri-food industry itself has been known to promote when convenient. This growing disconnect is fuelling greater interest and oversight into how food is produced, Rice says.

“Seventy years ago, half the population of this country was living on a farm, and I suspect the number wasn’t much different for Canada,” Rice says. “Now it’s less than two per cent. For most of us the agriculture industry is out of mind. Then in the past few decades, animal agriculture in particular has moved indoors, increasingly out of sight.”

As that’s happened, production practices have changed dramatiContinued on page 22 country-guide.ca 21

business Continued from page 21 cally, and some practices that the general public finds offensive have crept in, Rice says. He cites things like farrowing crates or other close-confinement housing as something most simply won’t accept.

“The pork industry has a problem because it’s keeping very intelligent animals in crowded conditions that have no enrichment. They’re treating pigs like machines, not animals.”

Clearly, farmers have a different perception, and they resent being portrayed as heartless when in fact they are the ones with the best insights into animal well-being.

Still, it seems another instance of a trend any industry watcher knows too well. Agriculture can be tone deaf. Or perhaps it’s fairer and more accurate to say, agriculture can find itself sitting in a corner of a room where everyone is talking, and not know how to get its voice heard.

Rice also takes issue with those who attempt to paint animal rights activists such as himself as uncompromising ideologues, saying that when you toss such accusations, you shouldn’t be too surprised to find the other side calling you an uncompromising ideologue too.

Plus, says Rice, the industry may not be helping itself by trying to always defend everyone and every practice.

Mercy for Animals has, on occasion, spent a lot of time and effort looking to work with the animal agriculture industry to find a middle ground, only to be disappointed in the end because the industry closes ranks, and takes an “edge of the wedge” approach that views even the smallest concession as too much.

“Everyone has an agenda,” Rice says.

“Frankly I think it would be a mistake to underestimate the level of knowledge and intelligence we have on our side of this debate.”

Because they have met stiff resistance on the policy front, especially at the state level where legislators have been loath to legislate animal welfare, Rice says the animal rights movement has taken the debate public.

On some occasions that’s meant releasing damning video. On others its meant pressuring large corporate entities like quick-serve restaurants into imposing their own standards that go beyond existing legislation.

Rice isn’t apologizing.

22 country-guide.ca

Defenders of the faith If there’s a polar opposite of Matt Rice, it would be Kay Johnson, president and CEO of the Animal Agriculture Alliance, an industry group dedicated, in its own words “… to advocate for producer interests and help the public appreciate modern science-based practices.”

Country Guide recently spoke to Johnson by telephone from her office in Arlington, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. From there, she frequently criss-crosses the U.S. for speaking engagements, meetings and other activities in her role as industry spokesperson. Doing so causes her to have a lot of airplane conversations with seat mates, and she mostly finds they are actually very interested, rather than hostile, when they find out what she does for a living.

“I find most people are actually very interested in the industry, and they might have concerns, but they’re willing to listen,” Johnson says. “In the end I always remind myself that less than three per cent of Americans have a vegetarian or vegan diet. The other 97 per cent, they want meat, eggs and milk and other products of animal agriculture.”

For Johnson the problem is twofold. The industry needs to be prepared to talk to the public and present what it does fairly and without shying away from the fact that it’s a business that has evolved well past the mental image most have of it. Ignoring this fact will only have the industry out of touch with current trends, she says.

Kay Johnson, president and CEO, Animal Agriculture Alliance.

Times have changed, Johnson says.

Today, the riskiest ag strategies are silence and inaction “We have definitely seen an increase in interest in how food is produced,” Johnson says. From food television to celebrity chefs and food bloggers, food isn’t just fuel anymore, it’s also become intertwined in fashion and personal politics and broader social trends. It’s something that’s only likely to increase in the future as well, since it’s something that appears to resound most strongly with the millennial generation, who are just coming into their own now and will increasingly drive and influence culture.

But she also says it would be a mistake to get drawn into debate with people who already have strongly held views they’re unlikely to be moved from. Better, she says, is to engage members of the remaining 97 per cent of people and show them what the agriculture industry does and why.

“Farmers aren’t going to just be able to rely on associations like ours to do it, either,” Johnson says. “They’ll need to do it themselves. It’s the farmers people want to hear from.”

That may mean anything from holding open houses at farms, to simply getting out into the community and becoming community February 17, 2015

business

leaders like New York’s George Zittel, she says. One interesting effort her organization has been behind lately is bringing leading food bloggers to a large-scale animal operation to let them see what happens behind the closed doors, then trusting those bloggers to fairly present the information.

“It was a risk,” Johnson freely admits. “We couldn’t guarantee what they would say. But once they visited the farm and saw what was being done, they all actually gave us very favourable coverage.”

It all boils down to accepting that times have changed, Johnson says, and these days the greatest risk appears to be silence and inaction, which allows others to frame the issue and sets up great challenges for the future. Taking a more active approach is going to be time consuming, but necessary.

Just two per cent Back in New York, for George Zittel it all boils down to simple electoral math, both at home in Eden and at the state and federal level. Farmers just don’t have enough votes, and they’re currently outnumbered by even vegans and vegetarians, and Zittel says there’s no way he can see that trend reversing any time soon.

“There are so few people farming now,” Zittel says. “You say it’s about two per cent. I’ll be honest, I’m actually surprised it’s that high. It certainly seems lower to me. And if you’re just two per cent of the population, boy, you’re not going to win much at the ballot box, if it comes down to that.” CG

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country-guide.ca 23

business

Tipping point Can American farms keep getting bigger?

Now, even big farmers have their doubts bout three hours north of the Gulf of Mexico, Louisiana Delta Plantation was the largest U.S. crop farm, working 100,000 acres. But that was only until 2005. Then the farm was broken up and sold.

During a decade of its dizzying climb, Eddie Davis managed up to 34,000 acres for the company. It was easy to buy into the philosophy, Davis now says.

Economy of scale means a farm’s cost to produce a bushel of grain should drop as the farm gets bigger.

Partly, that’s from more efficient operations.

Partly too, Davis tells Country Guide, that’s because of bulk buying. “When farming operations get to a certain size, they can buy implements more cheaply… sometimes much more cheaply.”

A large farm also seemed to have built-in sustainability that would carry it through times of low grain prices, Davis says. “Even with small profits, across large acres they add up.”

“ When things go right on a very large scale, it can be very good,” Davis says.

“But when things go wrong…”

By Amy Petherick

But economies of scale work both ways, Davis says, and it turned out that their Achilles heel was one they hadn’t anticipated. It was human resources, both at the senior and at the field level.

“The ability to find a manager who will manage within their parameters might be a challenge,” Davis says. “It may not be too troubling to go out and find five good employees, but to find 10 good employees may be three times as difficult.”

But there were other issues too. If you expand too much and outgrow your suppliers, you can quickly find yourself in a mess, Davis says. Take an equipment dealer as just one example. A mid-size farm might have a great relationship with a local dealer so they get excellent, fast service. When the farm outgrows the capabilities of the local dealer, however, it either has to invest in its own shop, or start looking for a dealer farther away. So even though you get a volume break on the cost of the equipment, keeping it in the field can introduce all sorts of new costs.

“There are efficiencies of scale, and there are also inefficiencies of scale,” Davis says.

It’s enough, Davis adds, to threaten the sustainability that the large farm was supposed to provide.

“When things go right on a very large scale, it can be very good. But when things begin to go wrong on a very large scale, it can begin to be very bad, very quickly.”

Davis now believes many more farmers across the U.S. are approaching a similar tipping point, or rather, a series of tipping points. Things look good now, he says, but as the number of acres goes up, any of these tipping points can very quickly eliminate the benefits of a bigger operation, especially tipping points centred on human resources management.

In fact, there’s already a question about whether the American race to bigger and bigger farms has begun to show the first signs of cooling off.

Despite the popular image of the U.S. as a country where everything about agriculture is supersized, including its farms, most operations there are incredibly small.

It’s a story that’s familiar in Canada, where the squeeze is on mid-size farms. Most U.S. farms are tiny and essentially non-commercial, generating under $1,000 of annual farm sales. The only thing big about these and other small American farms, according to the USDA’s most recent census in 2012, is their number.

Continued on page 26

24 country-guide.ca

February 17, 2015

soil matters………..www.ifao.com

Long-time No-till Pro, Dwayne Beck, Offers His Top 10 List written by Larry Dreiling

Dwayne Beck, Ph.D., and Manager of the Dakota Lakes Research Farm, in South Dakota shares what he's learned in his 30 years of researching no-till.

Dwayne Beck will be a speaker at the Innovative Farmers Conference on Feb 24 –25, 2015 Here is Dwayne’s "top 10 list" of the things he learned in his years of using no-till.

1. No-till is just one tool to use to manage the ecosystem. "It's not important to focus on techniques. We need to focus on results. People spend too much time looking at small details and miss the big picture."

2. Farmers and ranchers harvest sunlight, carbon dioxide and water to produce products they sell. "What percentage of these resources was wasted when the wheat-fallow system was in play?"

3. Weeds and diseases are Mother Nature's way of adding diversity to a system that lacks it. "Add beneficial diversity to prevent problems," Beck said. "Pesticide use decreases diversity."

4. High disturbance techniques increase weed pressure and weed persistence, as well as cause more tillage erosion when compared with low-disturbance seeding. "Tillage erosion increases variability in the field."

5. Sanitation, rotation and competition are the predominant methods of pest control. "Pesticides are only a means to those methods. Fertilizer is part of competition. Residue management is part of rotation and sanitation."

6.

Proper nutrient cycling is an extremely important factor. "Ecosystems that leak nutrients for extended periods of time become deserts," Beck said. "Salinity is a symptom of improper nutrient and water cycling. Nutrient placement is part of proper cycling."

7. Learning proper water cycling techniques is imperative. "Knowledge of the soil's water holding characteristics is necessary. Long-term rainfall data must be used," Beck said. "A producer's riskreward preferences are important and cover and forage crops are useful tools."

8. There should be no need to use a ground engaging component to seed and fertilize a crop. "Shoot seed stakes into the soil or use seed coats."

9. Livestock integration will be needed.

"Livestock work for nutrient cycling and rotational flexibility."

10. Long-term productivity will probably not be maintained without the use of perennial sequences in the rotation.

"Most of all," Beck says, "I've learned humility in the face of the tremendous ability of nature's organisms. It's far better to have them working for you than against you."

business Continued from page 24 Of the more than two million farms in the USDA’s 2012 Census of Agriculture, 55 per cent had under 100 acres each.

Another 30 per cent of farms had between 100 and 500 acres which, depending on region, made them small to mid-size.

Either way, however, the two groups that accounted for a whopping 85 per cent of U.S. farms actually farmed only about 20 per cent of the country’s farmland.

By contrast, farms with more than 2,000 acres represented fewer than four per cent of farms, but they controlled 56 per cent of the farmland.

So although, the average size of a farm in the United States is 434 acres, the overwhelming majority is either much smaller or much larger.

While the number of very small census farms continues to grow, James MacDonald, chief of the USDA’s structure, technology, and productivity branch tells Country Guide that the general trend across the United States continues to be toward larger farms.

Half of all American farm sales are generated by a mere 1.6 per cent of the country’s farms “Production has been shifting steadily to larger farms in just about all commodities, and all parts of the country,” MacDonald says. As a result, a small number of farms now accounts for a huge percentage of agricultural production.

In 2012, the top 1.6 per cent of farms accounted for 50 per cent of all sales, and the top 5.7 per cent produced 75 per cent. This is particularly evident in pork and cattle production, MacDonald says. Of more than 900,000 farms with cattle and calves, 42 per cent of sales came from 0.1 per cent of farms, which boasted over 5,000 head per herd.

At the other end of the scale, farms with fewer than 100 cattle made up more than 80 per cent of the total number, but generated just 10 per cent of sales.

Likewise, 4.8 per cent of farms with over 5,000 pigs held 67.7 per cent of all U.S. hogs and generated 65.4 per cent of sales.

In all, small commercial farms with gross incomes under $250,000 accounted for 41 per cent of farm sales in 1982, but then fell to 14 per cent by 2007.

In some regions in the U.S., this is partly due to the land itself, MacDonald says, because it’s simply become easier to farm on a large scale. “In the east, hill country, you really can’t get or put together a field with 150 acres that is all flat so you can run giant pieces of equipment over them,” says MacDonald. “Typically in the high plains, farms are much larger.”

Todd Kuethe is an assistant professor at the University of Illinois and has spent a lot of time 26 country-guide.ca

studying the USDA census data, which he says is really the best way to get an overall snapshot of farm sizes and the impact of economies of scale.

“The most recent census that was released last May, points to something that’s really interesting,” Kuethe says. “We all think of large farms dominating the ag sector generally, which is true, but we’re seeing this bifurcation where you have a lot of small-acreage farms, and also the consolidation of larger farms.”

But when he studies the size of farms and their ownership, Kuethe says he finds there hasn’t been a great structural change over the course of the last 15 to 20 years. “There hasn’t been drastic change in farm size or number of farms,” Kuethe says.

One of the implications is that there’s a significant number of non-farming landowners who are controlling farms in the U.S., who are likely becoming more removed from their agriculture roots.

But there has also been real growth in valueadded and niche production.

“These folks who are operating in niche markets, with small farms that are finding ways to target these markets, really seem to be growing,” Kuethe says. Very small farms can also be very profitable.

Of farms under 100 acres, four per cent had annual revenue over $100,000, and about one per cent reported over $1 million. Something that’s very highvalue on a few acres, like strawberries for example, can be very high in revenue but also low in acreage.

Kuethe says these operations also seem to have staying power. He points, for example, to a herb farm he toured recently, which is demonstrating remarkable earning power on a tiny land base.

“They sold to places like Whole Foods and directly to restaurants,” Kuethe says. But it wasn’t always simple, he adds. “It was very labour intensive, and those plants are way more delicate than soybeans.”

Still, Kuethe sees a good future for operations that are conveniently located close to urban areas, whether selling mushrooms, herbs, or targeted livestock breeds. Small-acreage farms, considered to be less than 10 acres, with sales over $500,000 are most often specialized, single-stage livestock producers, usually operating under contract to a larger company. In 2007, 75 per cent of small-acreage farm sales were in poultry and eggs, hogs and pigs, or greenhouse/nursery and were produced on only 15 per cent of small-acreage farms. Other very lucrative small operations included just 25 shellfish farms with combined sales of more than $36 million and 50 mushroom farms which sold over $147 million of produce.

MacDonald agrees. The future of mega-farms may be uncertain, but the future of mid-size commercial operations seems altogether clear. “Forty years ago, you might have made a living being a corn and soybean guy with 400 acres plus raising some hogs,” MacDonald says. “That’s really what’s shrinking fairly rapidly.” CG February 17, 2015

February 2015

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February 2015 The road ahead

page 4

Inoculation gains ground

10

Disease risk high

14

Market outlook, 2015

20

Digging into food-grade soybeans

24

The West’s big challenge

28

Grain analyzer gets attention

32

Need to know

34

Taking pulse

39

The bigger crop

I

t seems clear now that the momentum for 2015 is with soybeans. Acres will be up, and up, and up.

This is good news, but let’s admit that it isn’t as good news as it should be. Soybeans haven’t had the political leadership they need in either the East or the West. Both markets lack the dynamic processing sectors that are essential for exploiting the crop’s full potential.

It’s part of the unwillingness to invest and the overall short-sightedness on infrastructure that we see in Canada, especially on the part of the Canadian government. For a decade and more, we have pointed to South America with almost a sneer, saying that it may have the acres to grow huge piles of soybeans, but it can never move those piles to market.

Well, now it can. South America has invested, and while no one would say it has solved all its challenges, it is definitely making progress.

Country Guide readers will know too, based on reporting by our Gerald Pilger, that Australia has made great logistical strides in recent years, often in ways that let farmers invest in and share the profits of greater exports.

In Canada, meanwhile, the federal Conservatives write a never-ending series of welcome but very small and targeted cheques for one crop this week and another crop next week, or for one region today and another region tomorrow.

It’s part of a master plan to improve the competitiveness and the market orientation of Canada’s ag output, and in that regard, it’s money well spent.

But make no mistake; the success of the Canadian farm requires processing, and it requires efficient transportation.

2015 is an election year. You can bet that farmers will do their part, growing their own huge pile of beans. But will the federal parties take hard stands on their investments in infrastructure, or will we fall further behind?

Tom Button, CG Editor tom.button@fbcpublishing.com Soybean Guide, February 2015

3

Soybean guide

The road ahead What makes you so sure that you can plant more soybeans and still pull off good yields?

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

Fertilizer strategies need a serious rethink, agronomists warn, especially on second- and third-year soils.

4

S

oybeans, soybeans — and more soybeans. That’s the forecast from most corners of the agri-food industry, whether it’s based in Western Canada or in the East. Soybean production in Canada was big in 2014 and it’s on a path to grow even bigger in 2015.

At the same time, that growth will come at a cost for many growers, particularly in Ontario, where there are likely to be more second- and third-year soybeans.

One forecast says at least one-third of the acres planted in this province will be in second-year fields.

Yet there are also some hopeful scenarios to be seen as the growing season begins to unfold. Unlike 2001, 1993 or even 1988, weather extremes have popped in the past five years, yet crops have fared quite well, with better yields than expected. It’s a testament to two developments: that timely rains or warm spells really can make up for an otherwise poor season, and the public and private plant breeders are doing an excellent job incorporating the right germplasm to handle stress.

Even so, opting out of standard rotations puts that progress at risk. Although some in the industry are forecasting three million acres of soybeans for Ontario, Pat Lynch, an independent agronomist from Stratford, Ont., believes this figure could climb higher — maybe to 3.25 million.

A lot will depend on the influence of other cropping factors. Corn’s pricing below the US$4 mark at the end of 2014 together with poor winter wheat plantings are likely to drive more acres into soybeans for the year ahead. Even the federal government is projecting a production increase of 11 per cent across the country, with domestic crush to rise by four per cent and exports to jump more than 20 per cent.

Against that backdrop, says Lynch, it isn’t just the continuous nature of soybeans in the rotation, it’s the lack of a break between soybean crops. Some areas in certain counties have seen three years of soybeans out of the past four, even when corn prices were good.

“Some soils are just too heavy to grow much of a corn crop,” says Lynch, who happens to be the one forecasting at least a third of Ontario soybean acres will be second- or third-year fields. “The only thing that had changed was soybean prices being higher, so returns were better the last three years.”

Soybean prices are likely to remain better than corn for the time being, and more growers are trying other practices to help mitigate the effects of continuous soybeans, adding applications of certain fertilizers, planting earlier and ensuring Continued on page 6

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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they have the best varieties to suit their soils and farming practices.

Among the bigger concerns with continuous soybeans is the impact from diseases. (Read more about the situation on soybean diseases for 2015 on page 14.)

White mould has become a particular problem in the past two years in southern Ontario, the incidence of sudden death syndrome (SDS) is also on the rise, and soybean cyst nematode (SCN) continues as one of the more consistent yield robbers across the province. With that in mind, says Lynch, growers really need to be more vigilant with certain management practices.

“The weakest part of a soybean plant is below ground, and if growers could see how much disease is below ground, they’d be appalled,” says Lynch. That’s why something as simple as switching varieties can help by providing different genetic control of different diseases.

Lynch also cites use of a seed treatment, which he calls “a must.” For white mould control, some suggest decreasing population and widening the row widths, but Lynch isn’t convinced either measure is necessarily a benefit.

“In my experience, wide-row soybeans are just as prone where white mould is severe,” says Lynch, adding that wider rows on continuous soybeans tend to yield lower. “There is also no doubt that increasing seed rate is a good strategy. More years of beans means more diseases and more seedling death.”

Fertilizer considerations The big shift that Lynch believes we’ll see in 2015 is in crop fertilization.

There’s been considerable discussion in Ontario and the U.S. dealing with fertilizing soybeans. U.S. farm publications have featured grower testimonials on the 6

For 2015, growers need to avoid planting soybeans to cool wet soils, if at all possible.

Otherwise, they increase the risk of diseases, particularly white mould.

practice, some from farmers with more than five different in-season treatments.

As well, there have been urgent reminders from dealers and retailers, calling attention to the fact that in Ontario, soils in general are testing poorly, particularly on phosphorus (P) and potassium (K).

“More farmers will look at fertilizer but, unfortunately, too few will look at the basics of pH, P and K,” cautions Lynch. “They’ll be spending time and money on ‘silver bullets’ that are foliarapplied. It’s good to look at some of these products but it must be in a coordinated, well-thought-out fashion after you have the basics of N, P, K, magnesium and manganese addressed.”

with corn and soybeans,” says Moloney.

“That’s not really a rotation; growers are just alternating crops.”

Another problem that’s going to really challenge growers this year will be weed management. Moloney has seen more eastern black nightshade in his area, along with more pigweed. The herbicide resistance angle has not been a huge challenge in midwestern Ontario, says Moloney, but he’s seeing signs of Group 2 resistance showing up with greater frequency. And still another issue that will further confound the weed management situation is that of volunteer corn: there’s more of it and it’s getting harder to control.

“The weakest part of a soybean plant is below ground, and if growers could see how much disease is below ground, they’d be appalled.”

— Pat Lynch, independent agronomist Weed control Robert Moloney shares many of Lynch’s obser vations, par ticularly “breaking the cycle” that continuous soybeans doesn’t allow. Corn and soybeans do a tremendous service in rebooting the soils and adding an element of diversity that doesn’t allow disease, pest and weed cycles to become entrenched.

“Corn, with that one-year break in there, pretty much resets everything, so it’s not a big deal where it resets the yield bar,” says Moloney, a certified crop adviser with Boyd’s Farm Supply in Fordwich, Ont., north of Listowel. “With soybeans, you really do need that twoyear break away from the crop in order to reset the bar back to its full potential

“We had a lot this year, we sprayed a lot this year, and we should have sprayed a whole lot more, but we ran out of time and product, and it became a real challenge,” says Moloney.

Moloney also notes that one of the successes of late 2014 was communicating to growers that with more continuous soybeans, cutting back on tillage might be a means of reducing disease potential. But like Lynch, he sees the whole fertility and nutrient situation continuing, especially where many growers still believe soybeans to be the crop that doesn’t need any fertilizer, a notion that’s both stereotypical and inaccurate.

“Some still have a little bit of an attitude Continued on page 8

Soybean Guide, February 2015

Continued from page 6

that you don’t need to fertilize soybeans, but with potash in particular, because we’re pulling 50- and 60-bushel soybeans consistently, so we’re taking out a lot more potash, most of the time,” says Moloney. He’s even boosted his potash recommendations in the past couple of years. “We’re starting to get through that cycle where the soil tests are at best holding even and, in a lot of cases, are starting to slip on potash, just because we’re taking into account the yield and how much potash we’re taking out.”

Considerable jump in yields For Horst Bohner, a larger soybean crop in the province carries some defined risks, including diseases, weeds and the overall impact on rotations. The state of the winter wheat crop has been thrown into uncertainty, and corn’s late harvest and high drying charges through last fall have highlighted its struggles. That’s why

the historical numbers on soybeans are so gratifying to Bohner, the soybean specialist for the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

In 1984, the provincial average yield for soybeans was 34 bushels per acre, and for the first time in the history of agriculture in Ontario, there were a million acres of soybeans. In 1997, the province eclipsed two million acres for the first time, with a five-year average of 39 bushels per acre.

“Now the five-year average at 3.05 million acres is 46.5 bushels per acre,” notes Bohner. “If you look at it that way, we’ve made tremendous progress.”

Yet he concedes that the historical record doesn’t help the short-term prospects for growers, especially those who are facing second- and third-year soybean crops and what that can mean particularly on the disease front.

“I do think that we need to stress that the yield expectations have to be lower in second- or, especially, in third-year soybeans,” says Bohner. “You just can’t expect to get what you would if it was after corn

By the numbers Sources including Statistics Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA), indicate that production and acreage values for most of the soybean-growing area in Canada is on the rise. For 2014, Canadian production rose to 5.96 million tonnes, up 13.5 per cent from 2013. In terms of area, there were 5.45 million acres harvested nationally, an increase of about one million acres above the previous year. Ontario is the leader in production and acres with 3.8 million tonnes, up 17.1 per cent from 2013, according to StatsCan. Acreage in the province was set at 3.06 million acres.

Quebec’s and Manitoba’s numbers for production and area also increased, compensating for yield losses in both provinces. In Quebec, overall production rose to 898,000 tonnes, a six per cent jump, with harvested area up 20 per cent. Yields were down 11.6 per cent. In Manitoba, production jumped 3.7 per cent, to 1.1 million tonnes, with harvested area up 20.6 per cent, offsetting yield losses of 14.1 per cent (to 32.3 bu./ac.) from 2013.

In Ontario, projections are calling for another increase in soybean production, in large part due to the wet and delayed fall conditions, which curtailed winter wheat planting across most of southern Ontario. It’s estimated that only 600,000 acres of winter wheat were planted, and it remains to be seen how the crop will fare by spring. With so many challenges getting corn out of the field — together with poorer pricing expected for both corn and soybeans — it’s expected soybeans will take up much of the acres not planted to the other two crops.

8

— it’s pretty hard to pull off a 55-bushel field in second-year soybeans.”

In a stressful year, he adds, consecutive years of soybeans fare much worse than crops where rotations are maintained. In stress-free years, where there’s adequate moisture, sufficient heat, low pest populations, good weed management and adequate fertility, second-year beans will do quite well.

But with the introduction of any moderate to severe stresses such as excessive dryness, high aphid counts or white mould in a wet year, those second- and third-year soybean fields will be the first to show the effects.

To mitigate those second- and thirdyear risks, Bohner preaches the fundamentals. Reducing tillage is one practice which he believes can have an impact, and Bohner believes that dropping the seeding rate will create more air through the canopy, reducing diseases.

“There’s no question that lower plant stands have an impact on the incidence and severity of white mould, so the issue is around row width also, and there’s some evidence that wider rows play a role in this,” says Bohner. “But the bigger factor is the number of plants established per acre.”

Bohner also echoes Moloney’s concerns about weed control issues. Again, in a second- and third-year soybean scenario, growers are getting into that established cycle which only helps weed species become better-entrenched.

“Whenever you’re doing the same thing over and over, it’s compounding the problem,” Bohner says. “If it’s a Roundup Ready field this year, and you don’t have any glyphosate-resistant weeds, obviously we would suggest that you throw in some other actives to try to reduce the likelihood of developing resistant weeds, but there’s no reason why you can’t have a clean field again.”

So the bottom-line recommendation is to manage soybeans either for high yield through earlier planting, long-season varieties with more inputs, or in fields with a history of white mould, try a different strategy altogether. Select a variety with excellent white mould tolerance that is physically short, reduce the seeding rate, use wider rows, consider planting later and select a shorter season variety.

These factors will lower yields in years with no white mould but can go a long way in reducing white mould in a bad year. The yield benefits from reduced white mould will far exceed any losses that come from thinner stands. A foliar fungicide can also go a long way in reducing the impact of white mould. SG Soybean Guide, February 2015

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Soybean guide

New product for soys Although the inoculant market is overwhelmingly based on rhizobia bacteria, there is one product new to Ontario which is reportedly gaining some traction. It’s a mycorrhizal fungi, classed as a fungal inoculant (as opposed to a bacterial product). According to Kate Bruinsma, sales representative with Premier Tech Agriculture, Myke Pro L fits with the technical definition of an inoculant is a “beneficial

Inoculation gains ground

micro-organism (bacteria or

OMAFRA’s Horst Bohner now recommends always

fungi) encapsulated in carrier

inoculating. “There are some real benefits.”

material and applied to the environment for remediation

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

and enhancement of agricultural productivity.”

Available in Ontario since 2012, Myke Pro L is supported by one-year data in the province that has found a three bu./ac. yield increase across a large geographic area, from Oxford, Perth and Middlesex counties as well as around Walkerton to Beaverton, east of Lake Simcoe. Again, it’s just one-year data.

Two formulations were used depending on the equipment employed by the farmer.

Roughly half used the Pur Myke Pro L liquid product, applied in-furrow through kits on the drill or planter. The other option was the Myke Pro PS3 power formulation, which can be mixed on the seed at time of planting.

10

I

n the world of agriculture, there are very few constants. Most practices and standards last only until new research shifts our thought processes, or until a new challenge or a new opportunity changes the landscape.

There are plenty of recent examples.

Within the past decade, the hard-andfast rule of always planting corn first has changed; sometimes it’s better to get the beans in and go back to finish the corn when the conditions are right. Another is the rule about cold-water imbibition. As recently as seven years ago, this was something to avoid if at all possible.

Today we hear less about cold water uptake, and maybe it’s because of the hardiness of soybean seed or maybe it’s because our weather is getting warmer.

Bottom line, standards are always changing.

Now it’s happening with seed inoculant too. Until a decade ago the clear consensus among agronomists was that the only ground where it makes sense to inoculate is in first-time soybean fields.

Why waste that money when soils that have had soybeans in the rotation already contain high numbers of the nitrogen-fixing rhizobia bacteria?

Well, farmers spend it because it’s inexpensive insurance and it guarantees

the right source of rhizobia in the ground, helping to establish those nodules and get the plant fixing its own fertilizer.

According to Horst Bohner, soybean specialist with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA), inoculating — or pre-inoculating — soybeans is now just one more function of treating seed or the soil during the course of the planting season. It’s becoming as automatic as other seed treatments, or the notion of fertilizing soybeans with potash. Such practices may not have been part of the plan 10 years ago, but they’re becoming more front-of-mind today.

“We’re trying to make things as convenient as possible for the producer because of acreage, speed, and size,” says Bohner, who has completed a six-year study on the impact of inoculants in soybeans. “So the trend to pre-inoculants has been pretty good, and there are some real benefits to that.”

T he more that’s lea r ne d from research, the more often inoculants are being recommended. In past, it was enough to inoculate new soybean ground. But as Bohner has found, soil rhizobia on their own need a boost, hence the current trend towards preinoculants as a seed treatment, even on fields with a history of soybeans.

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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Bohner adds that in 2014, there were many fields with poor nodulation, mostly due to the cold spring conditions. Some producers he met had several hundred acres of first-time soybeans with no nodules, even though an inoculant had been applied.

Some of those failures, he notes, could have been magnified by the reliance on a single application such as a liquid inoculant or a pre-inoculant. Generally, it’s been found that if two products are used on first-time fields, there are fewer nodulation problems.

“It’s not just in those fields, and it’s not just the pre-inoculants, but certainly it’s about getting the right bacterial numbers on the seed,” says Bohner. “We need to be careful in first-time fields, and that’s what we learned again (in 2014), that a single pre-inoculant is not good enough; they need to put on two products to get around the issue of nodulation failures on first-time fields.”

“I think every field in the province — every year — should get an inoculant. It doesn’t hurt, and there’s a small net benefit to the producer for doing that on every field, every year.”

— Horst Bohner, OMAFRA Despite the changing mindset in using inoculants and preinoculants, the bacterial strain used as an inoculant hasn’t changed since the early 2000s. It was in 2002 that Dr. Dave Hume, professor emeritus at the University of Guelph, was testing the addition of Bacillus subtilis to the standard inoculant strain of Bradyrhizobium japonicum. On its own, B. subtilis is a common, naturally-occurring bacterium, but added to the rhizobium strain, it acts as a plant growth promoting rhizobacterium (PGRP), which in some fields stimulates early growth in soybeans. It is not, however, an inoculant by itself.

Bohner is aware of companies that are researching new strains — some from South America — but none of those are commercially available for use at this time. What he does see coming in the future is an uptake in biostimulants, plus nematode control or other products to allow better nutrient uptake.

But his take-home message for the time being is that there’s no reason not to inoculate.

“I think every field in the province — every year — should get an inoculant,” says Bohner. “It doesn’t hurt, and there’s a small net benefit to the producer for doing that on every field, Continued on page 12

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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every year. And 2014 was one of those years where it was cool and wet in the spring, and if you have an inoculant it just puts the nodules on a little bit faster.

Is it going to change the world? No, it’s about a bushel to 1.5 bushels per acre on average, but it doesn’t cost that much to put on, so why not do it?”

For Mike Verhoef, relying on inoculants is more one of those “getting back to basics” approaches that are earning more attention from farmers, agronomists, advisers, retailers and company representatives. He confirms Bohner’s statement about the companies being involved in more research into newer strains, but also the use of polymers, colourants and seed application processes. And he echoes Bohner’s contention that we need to be more specific with terminology and the differences between the inoculant (Bradyrhizobium japonicum) and the growth promoter (Bacillus subtilis).

Instead, he wants to focus on the farmer’s primary investment — the high-value, “traited” seed.

“By putting an inoculant on that seed, you’re guaranteeing that that seed has instant access to healthy, robust rhizobia and that it’s ready to start self-affixing nitrogen through the production of nodules,” says Verhoef, national seed company manager with BASF Canada. “Even though they’ve grown soybeans on that field before, and there will be rhizobia there, it doesn’t mean that there are the healthy robust rhizobia that it needs.”

Verhoef adds that he’s glad to have Bohner making the point about inoculation being an inexpensive form of insurance, and remembers his presentation at the Southwest Agricultural Conference in 2012. That day, Bohner spoke of his six-year study on inoculants and how there was little need for more study or analysis, just that inoculating works, so why not do it?

“If you ask any soybean expert, U.S. side or Canadian side, what are a few of the key things you must do on soybean production, inoculant is in the top three,” says Verhoef.

In Western Canada, where growers are becoming more familiar with soybeans and corn, they’re already sold on the benefits of inoculating. With a new pea and lentil inoculant — capable of boosting yield between seven and 11 per cent — most growers in the West place inoculating on a scale of impor12

“If you ask any soybean expert — U.S. side or Canadian side — what are a few of the key things you must do on soybean production, inoculant is in the top three.”

— Mike Verhoef, BASF Canada tance above seed treatments. So in that sense, says Verhoef, Western Canada producers are ahead of those in the East, where he says the industry is still encountering the notion that soybean ground needs no inoculant, unless it’s first-time ground.

“You could comfortably say that companies like ours are always looking for improvements in strains, improvements in formulation and improvements in carriers,” says Verhoef. “To do that, we’re always looking at new biologicals to add,

to make that whole process work better.

The biggest interest right now is this whole ‘ease-of-use’ and on-seed movement and making it easier for the grower, so we’ve put a lot of focus into that in the last five years — hence the whole pre-inoculant situation. But as we do that, ease-of-use is also part of lowering the application use rates, longer days on seed and the formulation processes.”

Research also continues into a formulation process to put more living bacteria in a smaller amount of product. SG

East versus West terminologies A point of interest in the world of inoculants is the use of terms like “double inoculation.” It’s used more in Western Canada, says Mike Verhoef, national seed company manager for BASF Canada. In Eastern Canada, the term is “full-rate” but in the final analysis, it’s the same thing.

In the West, half-rate is applied as a liquid pre-inoculant directly on the seed. Then, farmers typically apply an in-furrow inoculant, hence the “double” terminololgy. It’s actually the full-rate that some growers apply in the East (a pre- and then an in-furrow inoculant).

In Western Canada, growers also use their “double-rate” inoculants as a standard application.

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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Soybean guide

OMAFRA’s Tenuta calls white mould our most “fickle” disease

Disease risk high With so many rotations thrown out of sync, extra disease vigilance is essential for 2015

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

14

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here’s only one word to describe the outlook for soybeans in 2015.

It’s “more.” With a reasonable spring, Eastern Canada’s soybean crop may hit an amazing 3.25 million acres.

But acreage isn’t the only number that may be up. We’re also likely to see more fields with second-year and some with third-year soybeans.

Then, if the predictions hold true, we’ll also see more white mould (sclerotinia) and sudden death syndrome (SDS).

That’s bad news our diseases are on the move. White mould is usually ranked as the biggest yield robber in eastern Ontario and western Quebec, but last year saw it become a bigger issue even in the southwest. SDS was seen in more growing regions too, and in greater severity.

And soybean cyst nematodes (SCN) remained a considerable yield robber, not only across southern Ontario, but also farther east in the province as well.

Of course, Phytophthora root rot and Pythium damping off should never be ignored, wherever you are.

In other words, more regions are seeing more risks, and just about every farm needs to be on the alert in order to ward off a series of major threats.

Public and private agronomists are all looking at a tough 2015. Diseases were a problem last year, they say, but with an increase in soybean acres — along with more continuous soybeans — that trend is expected to continue, if not intensify.

“White mould, sudden death syndrome, soybean cyst nematode, the root rots and seedling diseases will be some of the biggest ones there,” says Albert Tenuta, field crops pathologist for the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. Tenuta adds that the threats are compounded by one of the key management tools to drive yield upwards — earlier planting into cool, wet soils.

White mould Tenuta calls white mould “the most fickle disease” facing growers, but it’s also Continued on page 16

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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the most frustrating from an extension and research perspective. Inoculum is often present, but in order to thrive, the disease requires very specific environmental conditions, particularly for moisture and temperature. In 2014, there were some exhibitor plots at Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show with visible symptoms of the disease.

“In the years where we have coolerthan-normal and wet conditions, we see what can happen with white mould,” says Tenuta. He notes that many producers have all but forgotten how destructive white mould can be and how it can impact yield. “We have a lot more sclerotia left on the soil surface and in the upper two inches of the soil profile, and those are the most critical within a season for developing the spores,” Tenuta says.

“They’re the ones that will cause you problems. Anything below two inches will remain buried and won’t germinate or develop into the apothecia and then the spores — they’ll just stay there.”

But surely, a grower might say, the conditions that made 2014 such a bad year for white mould aren’t likely to repeat in 2015. That’s true, but Tenuta points out that the inoculum load is that much greater, particularly in fields with beans on beans or beans on beans on beans, and this will increase the risk. And unfortunately, in no-till scenarios, those sclerotia are ready to spring into life within two inches of the soil surface.

So, would 2015 be the year for some light or moderate tillage to prevent those pathogens from developing?

Not necessarily, says Tenuta. Discing or cultivating the soil in the spring might just as easily bring any buried sclerotia back to the surface. And even if you end up with fewer sclerotia up where they can cause trouble, there may still be enough to create a serious risk.

The only way to really break the cycle is to maintain rotations — which is a challenge given the current pricing cycle.

“It goes back to all of these different diseases, and one of the most important things from an integrated pest management (IPM) standpoint is variety selection,” says Tenuta. “What growers do in the winter cannot be taken for granted.

Planning is critical to a successful growing season — and variety selection is the most important.”

Understanding white mould pressure 16

White mould is moving south, SDS is moving east, and more fields face more threats.

from field to field is paramount, because that’s how growers will be able to select the right variety for those fields. There’s no genetic resistance to white mould incorporated into current soybean germplasm or varietal lines, only tolerance to the disease.

Tenuta is quick to point out that there are also pre- and in-season treatments that have not been available to growers in the past, including biologicals that can be applied pre-plant that colonize and disrupt the sclerotia, plus newer in-season treatments that are being developed.

“We can often get some degree of control or suppression of white mould but we can’t get rid of it,” says Tenuta, adding that knowing which fields are susceptible is the first line of defence. “It comes down to genetics and germplasm and variety selection. I can’t overemphasize the importance of variety selection for the specific needs for your specific fields.”

The frustrating part of white mould is that unlike some other diseases or insect infestations, it doesn’t have a visual threshold that can be used for scheduling a spray. Once the disease is visible in a field, that field is infected and it is beyond the point where it can be treated via a chemical application, which becomes little more than revenge spraying. What’s more frustrating is that many of the measures that promote higher yields, such as higher plant populations, higher fertility and narrow rows, can provide the right microclimate within the canopy for the disease to flourish.

“The key in 2014 was that optimal environmental conditions stayed much longer than normal,” says Tenuta. “In most years, we end up with hot, dry conditions by the middle of July and into August, and even though we have white

mould starting, it doesn’t spread any further. In 2014 though, even with a preventive fungicide application (at R1 or R2) and even some later applications (around R4 or R5) the extended fall seemed to help the diesease. But Tenuta still says those early applications are something to consider, particularly if you have the higher-risk situations.

Sudden death syndrome According to several sources, sudden death syndrome is another emerging challenge for growers, and 2014 was another year of marked increases in the disease, particularly in southwestern Ontario. For the coming year, SDS may see another jump in area or in intensity, given the rise in acres and the increased frequency of second- and third-year soybeans.

“Again, variety selection is important and soybean cyst nematode resistance is important,” reminds Tenuta, drawing a link between SDS and soybean cyst nematode, which he often referred to early in 2014 as well. “And unfortunately, with SDS, it’s often our best fields that are showing the disease. It’s the same thing with white mould; high-fertility, highgrowth conditions promote white mould, and the same things happen with SDS. The good fields, the high-productive fields are often the first to show SDS and often see the most damage as well.”

Like white mould, SDS increases as growers continue to plant earlier into colder soils in an effort to push maturity on their soybeans.

It’s not that early planting is a bad idea, just that the risk of infection — and from more diseases — increases. With Continued on page 18

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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SDS, notes Tenuta, it’s cooler, wetter conditions, typically within the first two or three weeks of planting, that are very important to establishing the disease. It’s at that point the disease pathogen will colonize the roots and then wait until stress conditions occur or until later in the growing season when the typical SDS above-ground symptoms start to appear.

Even in a good growing season, Tenuta says, the disease can cause damage and yield loss.

It’s all the more reason for growers to know their fields and to understand the disease species that are present. Only then, Tenuta says, can they respond with the right integrated pest management strategy, including variety selection.

“Seed treatments are also important,” adds Tenuta. “Fungicide seed treatments are a necessity for soybean development and for maximizing yields, and we must not underestimate their importance.”

Tenuta has been working with U.S. researchers in the north-central soybean research program to look at sudden death syndrome as well as seedling disease, and also with the Grain Farmers of Ontario through a Growing Forward 2-funded project. They’ve noticed that with sudden death syndrome in particular, yield losses can run as high as five to six bushels per acre. And that’s just with normal planting dates.

In testing a new active ingredient seed treatment, however, Tenuta says the joint Canada-U.S. research project has found it gives a yield boost of three to four bushels per acre, even where the crop was planted at the end of April under cool, wet conditions into soils with a high SDS. “There are some good new tools coming down the pike that growers will be able to integrate into their management system, as well,” Tenuta says.

Soybean cyst nematode A long-standing pest of soybean fields, particularly in southern Ontario, soybean cyst nematode (SCN) continues to be a perennial leader in the “yield-robbing” category. In spite of standard sources of resistance (i.e. PI 78877 and the Peking sources) incorporated into varieties, the troubling issue with this disease pest is that there are some new Heterodera glycines (HG) types and nematode populations that are putting pressure on existing resistance sources.

In 2014, there were some resistant 18

Whether it’s nematodes, as above, or diseases, a good defence builds on genetics.

varieties that were more susceptible to SCN than in the past.

The other concern with SCN is that it is not as environmentally dependent as other diseases. Tenuta says regardless of weather or climatic conditions, there will always be some level of SCN infection, with consequences for fields. If it’s a highly stressed year, then even at lower populations there will be more potential for damage. In some good years, there may be little or no above-ground symptoms, but that doesn’t mean the damage isn’t being done.

Phytophthora and Pythium Of the prevalent diseases in soybeans these days, Phytophthora root rot and Pythium damping off are the most environmentally dependent. At the present time, Phytophthora resistance is fairly well entrenched, but Pythium is showing signs of developing a more diverse threat. Within the past decade, there were only one or two Pythium strains; now researchers are isolating nine or more from different varieties.

Even if resistance to Pythium is lacking in soybean germplasm, there are good seed treatments available, including Metalaxyl and Metalaxyl-M. Yet Tenuta says there are also signs of resistance to those active ingredients beginning to creep into fields.

“As our GFO-funded project has shown, we’re seeing all of these disease organisms get smarter and have the

ability to adapt to our management practices,” Tenuta says, speaking specifically of Pythium but referring in gener al ter ms to al l of t h e d i s e a s e s mentioned above.

Take-away message Again, Tenuta says he can’t overemphasize the need for preplanning and for farmers to know their fields. The work done in the middle of winter will pay its own rewards, he adds, especially if rotations are being sidetracked with back-toback, or back-to-back-to-back soybeans.

It is paramount to review field notes from previous years, to map out parts of fields where certain diseases may be a problem, and to diversify those varieties, perhaps planting five different varieties across five different fields rather than opting for a favourite or “workhorse” variety.

It’s also worth noting that these disease issues continue to develop and diversify, becoming part of the “normal” farming landscape. There is no single silver bullet solution, says Tenuta, and there is no single active ingredient that can be called upon to solve every issue, be it a disease, or a weed species or insect pest.

“We never had that (silver bullet) in the first place, but the seed is now being challenged by a more diverse pathogen population,” says Tenuta. “We’re going to have to depend on different active ingredients to hit those little niches of what we’re missing. It’s going to become more complicated in the future.” SG Soybean Guide, February 2015

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Soybean guide

Market outlook, 2015 W

Demand is keeping pace with increased production, but will that continue?

Here’s what to watch

By Philip Shaw

20

ith every new year come great challenges. For Canadian farmers looking out into their 2015 planning horizon, soybeans are increasingly a large part of that. Where once soybeans were relegated to the deep southwest of Ontario, now there are three million acres in Ontario and 836,000 in Quebec, plus over one million acres in Manitoba with continued expansion expected every year in Western Canada.

For the soybean, it seems the best of times. But will this continue? As we look into 2015, what are the market factors that will determine our price expectations?

It used to be said in southwestern Ontario that all you had to do was plant soybeans and wait. The conventional wisdom at the time was that you planted them in a cloud of dust, tried to control the weeds and eventually you would have a crop at the end of the day. However, over the years, with the expansion in the acreage, management has also evolved.

There is no particular silver bullet to increase soybean yields. It’s more of a silver shotgun involving many management factors which help achieve that goal.

It is the same on the soybean marketing front. In 2015, producers will need to consider many marketing factors that are impacting the soybean complex.

In 2014, Canadian soybean farmers watched from a distance as our American friends produced a record crop. The United States last year planted a record 84.2 million acres of soybeans and harvested a record yield of 47.5 bushels per acre. That was a tremendous increase in acreage from the previous year when U.S. soybean farmers planted a crop of 76.8 million acres. This record crop in the United States created somewhat of a bearish environment where prices moved down throughout 2014, bouncing back to some extent into a rally starting in late October. Of course the question that has to be asked moving forward is how many soybeans will U.S. farmers plant in 2015, and what impact this might have on price going forward.

According to many private estimates, U.S. producers are set to increase the area of soybeans to 88 million to 90 million acres this coming spring, beating last year’s record. If we put a hypothetical yield of 45

bushels per acre to that production, we’ll be very close to the record production of 2014 of 3.958 billion bushels. At first glance, it is certainly setting up as a year where a lot more soybeans get planted and if Mother Nature plays nice, there will be great production in the fields.

Keep the $10 soybean futures mark in mind. For instance, as the clock turned over to January in 2015, the nearby futures month was at approximately $10.02 a bushel. This put cash soybeans in Ontario at approximately $11.40 a bushel when you consider basis. Needless to say, the $10 mark in soybeans will always serve as a litmus test for some producers.

The production in both North and South American fields in 2015 will largely determine whether that price resides north or south of the $10 mark.

The $10 mark will largely be determined by crop size but also by demand and ending stocks. The projected U.S. ending stocks for soybeans in the 2014-15 crop year are 410 million bushels. This is considered quite onerous, especially when last year ending stocks actually dipped below 100 million bushels to 92 million bushels.

This was unprecedented at the time and reflected an unusual shortage of old-crop soybeans.

Looking ahead, if demand stays strong and even climbs possibly to 3.85 billion bushels in 2015, we may still end up with ending soybean stocks over 400 million bushels in the U.S. Of course the United States always has a tremendous effect on the price of soybeans, but our South American friends now grow far more than the United States.

For instance, the December estimate from USDA pegs U.S. production at 107.73 million tonnes of soybeans. When you combine Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay together you get production of 157.2 million tonnes. Clearly, this production in South America has a huge effect on the price of soybeans looking ahead. Into our mid-winter, South American weather has been benign, which is positive for soybean yields. This South American soybean crop size will be a critical factor in determining the price of soybeans.

Continued on page 22

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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The elephant in the room in any discussion with soybeans is China, which seems to have an insatiable appetite for the world’s soybeans. It is set to import 74 million tonnes in 2015 and this demand is growing. There is always a lag time between U.S. and South American supplies to China. This is likely to happen in 2015, just as it has happened in previous years. Last year with old-crop supplies being very tight, it was a bit of a scramble to source beans into China especially with the logistical problems in South America. This year, even with those South American logistical issues, more soybeans translate into a smoother transition on that import.

For Canadian soybean producers, there are two great production areas to look at, the United States and South America. First up is South America where soybeans will be flowering and filling in January and February with the main harvest commencing in March. Any weather issue in this time frame will affect the futures prices. It will be the same in the U.S. with the planted acreage figure being key to that equation. The first clue to how many acres American farmers will be planting will be announced in the USDA report on March 31, 2015.

Any discussion regarding grain prices in Canada must also include the value of the Canadian dollar. The Canadian dollar has dropped from par values in late 2013 down to the low 80s in January 2015. Soybeans are priced in U.S. dollars at Ontario end-users and a simple currency exchange can add large amounts on to cash values, especially when the dollar is low. For instance, oldcrop basis values sit at approximately $1.15 a bushel over the March futures in early January. A par dollar or the loonie at a premium means negative basis levels for soybeans. This movement in the Canadian

dollar must always be considered, as its importance to cash prices to producers is always critical. Hedging the futures and considering the Canadian dollar go hand in hand on Canadian farms.

However, it’s a two-way street. The value of the Canadian dollar is directly related to the value of the U.S. dollar and to some extent to the price of oil. As the Canadian dollar has dropped, the value of the U.S. dollar in comparison has done the opposite. It has been going up, acting as a drag on all commodity prices. In 2015 it will continue as long as the U.S. dollar shows buoyancy, and this will temper agricultural futures prices.

So as we move ahead into 2015, after the South American crop is in, North American acres will become very important. Along the way, USDA reports will always serve as flashpoints for market action. The March 31 USDA prospective plantings report will be the first big benchmark in the new-crop marketing year. The June 30 USDA planted acreage report will be the second big benchmark for futures prices going into summer.

Producers will need to consider these two reports when hedging soybean prices for the new-crop season.

The road ahead in 2015 for soybean farmers will surely be challenging. It is often said that soybeans can be the great liars, since their production potential is often very difficult to measure in season.

With expanded acres this year and somewhat onerous ending stocks, pricing those soybeans may add to their reputation.

However, at the end of the day, soybeans always tell the truth. There will be marketing opportunities ahead. Unknown geopolitical events can always come along to upset the most considerate market projections. Risk management never gets old, and that certainly is the case with soybean pricing in 2015. SG

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Soybean guide

Digging into food-grade soybeans This four-year study aims to exploit the best traits and qualities in IP soys

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

A Food-grade soybeans are sold to processors and manufacturers who are more sensitive to quality parameters, and intensely concerned with changes that might affect the consistency of their tofu or natto products.

griculture often has to take a look back in order to see what’s ahead. Farmers do it with their cropping plans and seed orders. Retailers and suppliers do it too, using the previous year’s experience to improve in the year ahead.

Now the food-grade soybean sector is embracing the same strategy. Thanks in part to a federal research grant and the participation of three industry partners, researchers at the University of Guelph will identify the most desirable traits from past and present varieties, and build a process for incorporating them into future seed.

The Guelph team is led by soybean breeder Dr. Istvan Rajcan with grants f r o m t h e Na t u r a l S c i e n c e s a n d Engineering Research Council through its Collabor ative Research and Development fund (NSERC-CRD).

Other members of the team include research associate Chris Grainger, PhD candidate Robert Bruce, Dr. Milad Eskandari from Guelph’s Ridgetown Campus, and Dr. François Belzile from Laval University.

In today’s environment, if a researcher has industry support, they can leverage matching federal dollars. “And that’s what we did,” says Rajcan. “We worked on that idea for a couple of years and tried to find partners within the industry who were willing to support it, and we were successful.”

The result is a four-year program, with support from Grain Farmers of Ontario (GFO), SeCan and Huron Commodities Inc. In all, Rajcan and his colleagues have received nearly $2 million in government and industry support, with more than $500,000 from the three industry partners.

“We can build this new strategy of incorporating everything that’s positive for various traits into new varieties that would be superior for more than one trait.”

— Dr. Istvan Rajcan, University of Guelph

24

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The project is looking into the genetics of various important traits for soybean breeders. Food-grade is the primary focus at this stage, and the reason is simple: the private sector is turning out new crush varieties, but the food-grade side is largely dependent on public breeders, and varieties such as OAC Bayfield, OAC Kent, OAC Wallace and OAC Prudence are all examples of the success of programs at Guelph and the university’s Ridgetown Campus.

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Lots of variation, lots of lines In this second year of the project, work is proceeding from a historical perspective. Most of the first accessions — the ancestral lines — of soybeans grown in North America originated in Asia, specifically China, Japan and Korea.

Those first lines are still the foundational genetics used in soybean breeding programs across the continent. By Rajcan’s calculations, 35 ancestral lines account for about 90 per cent of the genetics in Canada and the U.S. Fortunately, there’s considerable diversity within those 35 lines, and a lot of the diversity has been already utilized in the breeding of some 300 lines, representing commercial and experimental cultivars, says Rajcan. “About two-thirds of those 300 lines come from the Guelph program and onethird are from the Ridgetown program.”

The next stage is very scientific.

Rajcan’s PhD student is working on genotyping those 300 varieties using sequencing methods. That creates a lot of molecular marker data to characterize those lines genetically and look for differences between them. Researchers are also comparing those genetic variations with the phenotypic differences to identify desirable traits such as yield, oil content, protein content, fatty acid profile and isoflavones.

Ultimately, it’s hoped the research will identify those similarities among the best performers, with a final goal of incorporating those common traits into superior-performing varieties.

Continued on page 26

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“Once we figure out what is common for each trait, then we can build this new strategy of incorporating everything that’s positive for various traits into new varieties that would be superior for more than one trait,” says Rajcan.

Early in the process For the time being, this research is at a type of “search and discovery” stage, with the end-goal of having a better genetic toolbox for Canadian soybean breeders when its four-year run is complete. That would give them the molecular markers that are important for developing a high-yield, superior quality variety. And Rajcan emphasizes that he and his colleagues are looking to improve everything, not just yield: specific qualities and even disease resistance traits are under consideration.

“The goal is to ensure that variety development down the road isn’t missing out on variations that can improve varieties for Ontario.”

— Dr. Josh Cowan, Grain Farmers of Ontario “Some researchers would refer to this as a certain kind of pedigree-based association mapping,” Rajcan says. “And I’m aware of the private seed sector conducting association mapping studies, but I’m not sure if they’re looking at a historical perspective as much as we are. The benefit of looking at it from a historical perspective is that we can see what changes in the genome have led to certain changes in the phenotype of the plant.”

As it stands, public and private sector breeders have different objectives that can vary greatly. The private sector wants to quickly produce new varieties with a focus on improved traits. The

public sector breeding programs on the other hand, focus primarily on specific traits, often related to those properties most desired within the food-grade sector, and usually sought-after by the food processors and manufacturers. It’s a part of the food-grade industry that’s of particular interest to the Grain Farmers of Ontario. For years, GFO directors and executives have been advocates for more value-added opportunities to boost net grower revenues.

“When you’re looking at food-grade, it’s a market-driven entity, so the customer gets familiar with the variety, and they’d like to have the same variety for a long

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Left: Researchers at the University of Guelph are engaged in mapping the soybean genome in such a way that it will enable breeders to select for more of the desirable traits for future varieties.

time,” says Crosby Devitt, GFO’s vice-president of strategic development. “The customer understands it and they know how to process it properly versus a commodity where if you’re making meal and oil, variety changes aren’t as significant to a crusher as they would be to a tofu manufacturer where small changes can make a big difference to their process.”

Devitt adds that with food-grade soybeans, there’s also the need for a stable and profitable market. To develop that market, Ontario food-grade varieties need to be able to compete with commodity varieties. To look at that from a breeding perspective, he notes, breeders like Rajcan must accommodate more targets for traits and quality characteristics than a commodity soybean. Perhaps what makes the food-grade sector more intriguing is the longevity of some of the varieties that the public sector has developed. OAC Bayfield, for instance, had a lengthy and productive history of combining good agronomics with consistent quality across a large geographic area, all the while managing year-to-year variability.

Another testament to the public breeding sector is news from Martin Vanderloo, president of Huron Commodities. In a message sent to Rajcan just before Christmas 2014, Vanderloo spoke of the successful sales of quantities of seed of the varieties OAC Madoc and OAC Prudence in parts of Russia and Ukraine.

Both are short-season varieties.

The right needle in the haystack Dr. Josh Cowan is GFO’s new manager of research and innovation, and joins Devitt in praising this project and the work of Rajcan and the team of researchers. He notes that this type of mapping of the soybean genome is aimed precisely at developing the best varieties for Ontario conditions.

“There tend to be a lot more specific characteristics looked at on the food-grade side of the soybean,” says Cowan. “So to be able to understand what we have available to work with in a breeding program in order to meet those end-user characteristics is important. And the food-grade soybean marketplace for Ontario is key. From the project perspective, the goal is to ensure that variety development down the road isn’t missing out on variations that can improve varieties for Ontario.”

Underlying part of this project is a particular need for the other two partners — SeCan and Huron Commodities. By participating in this research, the companies will benefit from developing a breeding-and-traits pipeline for identity preserved (IP) or food-grade soybean varieties similar in approach to what some private-sector companies have been doing in the IP sector for years. Sevita has been developing its varieties through ProSeed, one of its parents, and the same was the case for Thompson’s Elite IP program, which benefited from work done

by Hyland Seeds prior to its purchase by Dow AgroSciences.

Now with this University of Guelph project, SeCan and Huron Commodities can benefit from the same type of opportunities.

“I think what we’ve seen as a strategy in a breeding program is that you don’t target one trait; you want to keep variability in your program,” says Devitt. “So every year, the material you’re generating has a range of different traits in it. You don’t know 100 per cent what the market will want 10 years from now, but you’re maximizing your chances of having something that fits.” SG Soybean Guide, February 2015

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Soybean guide

The West’s big challenge Despite their province’s soaring soy acreage, Manitoba’s hog industry is still locked into expensive imported soymeal. Worse, change may still be years away

By Ron Friesen

I

t was another banner year for Manitoba soybeans in 2014 with production hitting a record 1.1 million tonnes, up 3.7 per cent from 2013.

Figures from Statistics Canada show that, although average yields dropped 14 per cent to 32.3 bushels per acre, a 21 per cent increase in harvested area more than made up for lower yields.

Since soybean meal is a basic ingredient in hog and poultry rations, you’d think Manitoba livestock producers would be rubbing their hands at the prospect of feeding their animals locally grown soybeans instead of having to import them.

Unfortunately, most soybeans consumed by livestock in Manitoba aren’t grown in the province. Instead, almost all the soybeans grown in Manitoba end up being shipped out of the province for other markets because of a lack of processing capacity.

Manitoba has only three small soybean processors, one of them a roaster.

Although they do serve the local market, they provide only a small fraction of the soymeal fed to livestock in the province.

28

Nearly all soymeal used in Manitoba is imported from feed mills in the U.S. or Eastern Canada.

So, while soybean production in Manitoba grows by leaps and bounds, livestock producers watch unit trains haul locally grown soybeans to the West Coast and elsewhere, while soybeans from other regions come in across the border to fill the void.

The industry is acutely aware of the irony of shipping soybeans out of the province while at the same time importing them to make up for the loss.

Officials agree it would make economic sense to process soybeans here, given the extra cost of transportation and a higher import price resulting from a slumping loonie.

The industry sees real benefits for livestock producers. “Hopefully we will be able to stop importing soymeal, start paying in Canadian dollars, avoid currency fluctuations and pay less in transportation,” says Andrew Dickson, general manager of the Manitoba Pork Council. In return, Dickson says, soybean producers would gain from a large, stable market so close at hand.

Soybeans make up a significant part of hog producers’ feed requirements.

According to livestock analyst Janet Honey, the Manitoba swine industry uses almost two million tonnes of feed a year.

Rough estimates show soymeal represents over 10 per cent of that amount. The volume of feed consumed annually, which includes soymeal, would increase by 40 per cent if all the pigs produced in Manitoba were fed to slaughter weight instead of being exported as weanlings and feeders, Honey says.

Soybeans are becoming a feed of choice for Manitoba swine producers because of their high meal and protein content. According to the Canadian Grain Commission, soybeans yield 80 per cent meal and 20 per cent oil when crushed, compared to 60 per cent meal and 40 per cent oil for canola. Soybeans also average 40 per cent protein content, compared to just 20 per cent for canola.

“I would say 100 per cent of rations for pigs in Manitoba have soybean meal in them. Producers feed wheat and barContinued on page 30

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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ley for energy and soybeans or canola for protein,” says Robyn Harte, a Manitoba Agriculture, Food and Rural Development swine specialist.

As soybean production increases, and as more producers turn to soymeal as a feedstuff, the need for more processing capacity in Western Canada becomes more acute. But what would it take for a major company to locate a soybean crushing plant here?

Unfortunately, despite more than doubling its soybean acreage since 2011, Manitoba still lacks the critical mass needed for a major crusher, industry analysts say.

“These plants need economies of scale to be competitive,” says Jonathon Driedger, a market analyst with FarmLink Marketing Solutions in Winnipeg. “We don’t have the kind of production that would come close to justifying the investment you would need for a competitive plant.”

Chris Ferris, a market analyst with Informa Economics in Winnipeg, agrees.

“At this point, I would say we’re probably not there yet,” says Ferris. “But if we keep expanding acres the way we are, I would see that it would probably make sense to throw in a crush plant here at some point in the future.”

It’s a chicken-and-egg argument, according to Harte. Right now, the soybean acres in Manitoba aren’t enough to lure a large processor. “But unless you have a processing plant, what’s going to entice people to plant more soybeans? It’s like the snake eating its own tail,” Harte says.

That raises a critical question: How many acres of soybeans would be needed to make building a crush plant in Western Canada worthwhile? This is where analysts hedge their bets.

A recent presentation by Grain Farmers of Ontario noted “huge momentum shifts in seeded soybean acreage” in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. It cited reports suggesting that Western Canada’s growers could seed as much as five million acres of soybeans in the next five to 10 years, most of it genetically engineered.

“With continuous improvements in genetics and production technology, Canada will continue to see increases in yields across the country in both non-GMO food grade soybeans and genetically engineered,” the report says.

Ferris says he has heard Monsanto officials privately suggest seeded soybean acreage in Western Canada could hit six to eight million acres in the next 10 years.

Assuming that’s possible (and it’s a big “if” because soybeans are still a high-risk crop in Western Canada), would that be enough to entice a multinational giant such as ADM to locate a soybean crushing plant in the West? Or would small, locally owned plants be better suited to the task?

Ferris says a lot depends on technology. Small plants are cheaper to run and can break even on relatively low volumes, while large plants in the U.S. and Ontario require major volumes to be profitable. Also, crushers need to be competitive and willing to pay the necessary price to attract product. A low Canadian dollar, which favours exports, could encourage soybean growers to sell to a more financially attractive U.S. market instead of marketing their beans locally.

“We’re not going to pay more for Manitoba stuff if we can get it cheaper from the U.S.,” says Dickson.

Ferris suggests one solution could be to convert an existing canola crushing plant into a swing plant which could also process soybeans. In that way, crushers can accept soybeans when market conditions are favourable for them. The rest of the time Soybean Guide, February 2015

they could concentrate on canola. But, again, it depends on the technology. Ferris says swing plants work best when designed to operate that way from the start. Retrofitting a canola plant to also accommodate soybeans is more difficult.

In the meantime, it appears Canada will continue to be more of a soybean exporter than a user. According to Grain Farmers of Ontario, soybeans are the third-largest agri-food export in Canada, totalling nearly 3.5 million tonnes in 2013 for a value of $2.1 billion. Canada exports soybeans to over 50 countries. The U.S. is the biggest customer, followed closely by China. The Netherlands and Japan follow.

It’s difficult to say where soybeans from Manitoba end up.

Driedger says growers used to sell to elevators in northern U.S. states. They still do. But major grain companies now report that higher soybean volumes resulting from expanding acreages enable them to assemble 100-car train units to ship to Vancouver. That makes Asia a likely market.

However, there’s still a chance the livestock industry might become a catalyst for processing more soybeans at home. Hog producers are slowly beginning to rebuild their herds after several years of depressed prices and a recent outbreak of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV). More pigs requiring more soybeans could encourage producers to grow their own beans and have them crushed locally.

“If you saw a meaningful ramp up in those herds over the course of a couple of years,” Driedger says, “that could increase the demand for soymeal.” SG

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Soybean guide

Grain analyzer gets attention With more soybeans and corn stored on farm, this new analyzer is paying off

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

I

t’s easy to see why grain analyzers and testers are garnering more attention in ag circles, from the farm all the way up through elevators and even at large-scale processors.

With tighter margins and a greater focus on finding efficiencies, but also with more focus on traceability, more interest in new traits, and more markets for end uses that have very specific quality parameters, it all adds up to more potential payback for knowing exactly what you’ve got.

In 2014, for instance, moisture became the bane of many corn growers, particularly at harvest, with plenty of accounts of corn arriving at local elevators and getting tested at 30 per cent or more before heading into the dryer.

Grain analyzers won’t tell farmers anything they didn’t already know about moisture levels above 30 per cent. But in the chase for margins, a little can go a long way, says John Lounsberry of Champion Industrial Equipment in Cornwall, Ont. Lounsberry is an ag specialist, and sees the need for more precise grain analysis, primarily from a moisture perspective, although the future for grain analysis is anything but limited.

“If you’re a grain buyer in the winter months — spring and fall, too — to get your tester to work, you do it usually by warming it up in a microwave, on a hot

32

plate or just letting it sit out,” says Lounsberry. “But all the time, moisture is leaving the product, and that moisture is the customer’s money — it’s still in your sample.”

For the sake of argument, continues Lounsberr y, say the moisture loss amounts to just 0.5 per cent, which he agrees doesn’t sound like a lot. However, when that percentage is translated throughout an entire truckload sitting at the elevator, it’s money out of someone’s pocket. And if the moisture level is too high — as was often the case with harvested corn in late 2014 — some elevators or processors would send truckloads back to the farm, at the farmer’s expense.

One of the units that Lounsberry sells is the Dickey-john GAC 2500 grain analyzer, a self-contained system that provides precise moisture and density results at operating temperatures of -20 to 45 C. It has a touch screen and a USB port for portable data storage and it keeps a running Excel spreadsheet, enabling a buyer to enter the ticket number on the sample.

The farmer can also enter the part of a field where the load or the sample originated, and it can be interfaced with a computer. Although corn was the hot topic for late 2014, Lounsberry assures growers and elevator operators alike that the GAC unit can perform the same pre-

cision analysis on all grains and oilseeds, including wheat/cereals and soybeans.

One other advantage is that it can analyze or measure ice as water — up to 19 per cent moisture.

It’s also certified by the National Type Evaluation Program (NTEP), administered by the National Conference on Weights and Measures.

More use, more value The 2014 growing season marked the first year for sales in Canada for the GAC 2500, and sales were shared almost equally among growers and elevators.

Lounsberry suggests that since commodity prices are expected to remain low for the foreseeable future, it’s possible that more farmers might be in the market for such analyzers as a means of reducing operating costs and maximizing revenues.

The University of Guelph was the first customer to purchase a GAC 2500 in Ontario. Students are doing their plot work and wanted to keep their own data files on their results.

Some growers may view grain analysis that is specific and accurate as the primary value of such technology. And on a face value, that’s very true. But the term “value” is getting more exposure, both as commodity prices are pulling back from the dizzying heights of early to late 2013, and as processors and manufacturers continue to find new uses, thereby requiring stricter quality specifications. It isn’t just money lost in dried corn or a rejected load, it’s the value of that time on the road driving that truck back home. Farmers are getting better at placing a value on their time, but it’s still a part of their on-farm management regimen that is seldom recognized.

“That’s usually what I point out — the costs — and they realize that overdrying can cost them a lot,” says Lounsberry. “For one thing, the elevator will buy that moisture, and you will use a lot of propane, and that’s a real cost. And the other way is underdrying where the elevator may charge you or possibly send you back.”

As for other functions, the GAC 2500 Soybean Guide, February 2015

is capable of performing grading on grains, specifically bushel weight densities.

“We work with Canadian Grain Commission standards, and this year (2014) has been a particularly critical year for grain grading, and I was told that it’s the difference between making money and not,” states Lounsberry. “Your value drops as you go down the chart. The growers say they can take a hit going from Grade 2 to Grade 3, and that’s not so bad. But not from Grade 3 to Grade 4.”

The technology also has its applications with larger farming operations that have followed the trend of the past five years that has seen an increase in the construction of on-farm storage. At the time, the word from engineers and extension personnel was that farmers must be extra cautious about monitoring and managing their stored grains, and that part of what elevators charge for storage includes all of the risk and liability that goes with that service. When the grain is stored on a farm, that liability shifts back to the farmer, meaning farmes need to ensure their quality is maintained. And a grain analyzer can go a long way to providing more information about the crop that’s in storage.

Upgrades or up-scale Unlike a lot of other pieces of “precision ag” systems and equipment that are purchased for on-farm usage, grain analyzers, at least the GAC 2500, aren’t prone to upgrades or redesigns.

These units won’t be upgraded in a year or two or even three years, but will be in the form of software enhancements, and those are provided as part of the purchase.

“There are what I refer to as clear leaps in technology,” says

Soybean Guide, February 2015

Lounsberry. “And there’s a fair gap between the last analyzer, which was on the market for more than 10 years. But this is a clear leap forward and I think the manufacturer is going to stay with this approach to the technology, and they may improve some of its operation, but basically it’s going to be something in the same nature of the current technology.”

It’s the type of precision that the GAC unit provides — plus its ease of operations — that makes it as popular as it’s become with farmers, elevators and large-scale processors. If more precision and detail are required, Lounsberry points to the InstaLab 700 NIR — also manufactured by Dickey-john — for measuring higher-value traits and properties. This particular unit is built for crushers or processors with the goal of selling to higher-value buyers and food manufacturers — businesses that are looking for more qualityrelated information on protein, fat or oil constituents. SG

33

Soybean guide

It’s time to demand more individualized agronomic help and product support from your input suppliers

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor

34

Need to know W

alking around the grounds of Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show in 2014, one of the messages that was shared among dealers and company representatives was this notion that farmers are looking for a more focused approach to boosting production and following practices that are more sustainable.

One theme that was touched on repeatedly was that the days are long gone of large groups of growers attending launches and meetings to hear about “the latest, greatest” new seed lines. Welcome to the era of more individualized dealings.

It wasn’t a revolutionary concept because it’s not as though dealers, agronomists and farmers were loathe to work individually in the past. There has always been a united goal of driving yield and helping the farmer succeed. After all, success of one usually translates into success for the other.

Yet something in the past couple of seasons has changed in terms of the approach of dealers, retailers and company sales representatives. Perhaps 20 years ago the focus was often on “the New” as opposed to whether a variety, new active ingredient or tillage implement was in line with any one farmer’s management practices. In fact, in the case of varieties and hybrids, the breeding and research pipeline has done such a tremendous job that the sector is approaching a level of parity that in the past was unheard of. Today there are very few of one company’s hybrids or varieties that completely outclass those of another — the playing field is becoming level.

The biggest change is the degree of complexity that has become standard operating procedure in farming today. It’s not that it’s been a sudden departure from regional promotion of one hybrid or vari-

ety. According to many company representatives, agronomists, dealers and retailers, that process has been unfolding for at least five years, and some might say longer than that. But it’s the layers of information — the maps, the fertilizer plans, the cropping plans, the increasing attention to soil health issues, crop protection principles, the advent of complex machinery and technology systems — that have changed the way farmers are farming.

And that’s changing the way the agrimarketing sector is dealing with farmers.

A matter of efficiency When you ask Wayne Black how he views this shift, he likens it to advances in television technology. As seed sales and production specialist for Devolder Farms of Dover Centre, Ont., near Chatham, Black started his career with First Line Seeds in Guelph, and remembers the mass-appeal approach of selling one or two varieties to farmers within a large geographic area. He compares that practice of the 1970s and ’80s to the days of the black-and-white television — everyone had one of those at least. By the 1990s, the varieties and hybrids were more technologically advanced, particularly with the introduction of Bt corn hybrids and glyphosate-tolerant soybeans.

Growers could also target individual fields with those technologies. Enter the era of the colour television.

“What we’ve got today is that we’ve been able to pull that down into a highdefinition TV, to be able to sit down with a grower and say, ‘You have this 50-acre field, and on this particular section of Continued on page 36

Soybean Guide, February 2015

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your 50-acre field, you’re going to plant at a certain population and you’re going to plant this variety’,” says Black.

Of course, the technologies by which seed can be planted, measured (variable rate), fertilized (split applications), tested for nutrient levels or protected against disease, pests and weeds have all changed as well.

All of these things are happening with a narrowed focus on a much smaller scale, such as just one part of a field instead of the whole farm as in the 1970s. There’s more information to share and to co-ordinate, says Black, with greater specificity and a broader capacity for capturing data points and details.

It’s not just the variety or the hybrid that’s central to crop production. All of the parameters, which might not have been so accurately accounted for 30 and 40 years ago, are being precisely managed today, or can be. In fact, in his televison analogy, Black sees going a step further to a three-dimensional, flatscreen colour TV. It’s not so much a different approach, says Black, as it is learning to use different tools with a clearer set of goals. It’s moving from managing a 50-acre portion of a field to a 50-square-foot parcel. It’s not there yet, but it’s getting to that point.

“We’re closing in on turning Precision Agriculture into Decision Agriculture,” Black says.

The need for technology Asked if he ever sees some level of pushback, Black concedes that a technology or a new concept advances only as far as individual farmers want to incorporate it. Looking back at the early days of GPSbased technology, we can see how combines were outfitted with yield monitors to mark the beginning of that trend, and the early adapters were the ones to lead it forward. But it took time for “everyone” to join that wave.

When variable-rate technology (VRT) was introduced a couple of years later, there wasn’t the same eagerness to find the early adapters — and for two reasons.

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two, VRT was, in many ways, a step up from yield monitors and maps. It’s taken the industry more than 15 years to reach the level where VRT is beginning to show the same value as yield monitors in the late 1990s.

That, says Black, is where there is a shift in the practical side of farming. The technology has become so advanced, in concert with a sharpened focus on agronomics, that farmers are increasingly relying on professional help to make the most of maps and data points and the products of advanced breeding.

“Today we’re creating more accurate yield maps, and growers are either doing it themselves, or they’re handing them off to somebody else to overlay with other maps they currently have from their farm operation, to start the move towards a prescription on an individual farm basis,” notes Black.

One of the advances that’s enabling efficiencies, and that “precision to decision” approach, is the speed with which information can be transferred. Black states in many cases, by the time a dealer drives out to the grower’s house or field, that grower can have the

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data on their desktop computer or mobile device, and have it analyzed before the dealer can pick up the phone to call the grower and set up a face-to-face meeting. It doesn’t always happen that way but that’s the concept that’s in development right now.

“It’s recognizing what we’ve done in the past but not dwelling on it, and being open to what the future provides,” says Black, adding that people within agriculture will have to change as the technology changes with it. “And it’s the same with the growers — some of the growers who are adopting this technology are in their 20s and 30s — some of them are also in their 50s and 60s.”

A difference among generations That age factor and the ability to incorporate the changing technology are also front-of-mind for Brandon Yott, product development and marketing specialist with the Agromart Group, based at Belton, Ont., north of London. Yott points to the growing concerns surrounding retirement-age professionals in the agri-marketing sector and believes that’s also influencing how technology is adopted and how information is interpreted and utilized.

In the past, it was easier to train a relatively younger workforce coming out of university and entering the agri-food industry. But the prescriptive approach requires more knowledge, including historical references, and not just of the farmer’s field, but of a particular variety’s lineage or its past performance. Yott doesn’t want to discriminate on age, but the fact remains: older dealers, agronomists or sales representatives have that long-term insight through sheer repetition and years of experience. Yet all of that is changing as the old guard enters retirement age, leaving this increasingly complex relationship to a younger cohort.

“You already have this ‘new worker’ shortage, and unfortunately in our industry, it’s hard to bring in outside labour,” says Yott, adding that such individuals may not have the same awareness of the market or growing conditions. “If they’re from outside of the farm, the learning curve to get into the seed industry is phenomenal. Your agronomic information and the genetics have to come to a whole new level, and more information is needed to help sell a specific variety on a producer’s farm.”

In any industry, it can take someone new to the job as much as a year before they’re really up-to-speed with that particular business or that industry, even with a core set of competencies or skills. Yott contends that in agriculture, that process can take twice as long.

What complicates matters even further is the depth of information that farmers are dealing with. Yott echoes Black’s contention about the complexities of change — of planting multiple hybrids on a planter or using fewer nutrients or targeting them to a specific region of a field. Yott relates a statement from a dealer he knows who said that in the past farmers came to them for information; now they’re coming to them with information. And they want help sorting through data points, coloured maps, soil test scores, digesting that information and finding those few nuggets they can use to drive production in a sustainable manner.

“If Ontario’s average was 150 bushels for corn, there are a lot of hybrids that can get you there without any issues,” says Yott.

“If you want to go to that 300-bushel level, well, now you need to reach that top end, and there’s a whole bunch of factors that are coming together. And to try saying, ‘Let’s look at it at a Continued on page 38

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Continued from page 37

much more prescription-based, field level-based perspective, with precision planting, prescription nutrition, soil types varying across your field’ — they’re all leading to this new world of what’s right for my field, and sub-field, as opposed to what’s the best hybrid from Windsor to Ottawa.”

Yott says he often links this notion to that of investing or insurance, where diversity and recognizing certain conditions are key to reducing risk and maximizing performance. Maybe 2015 is shaping up to be a dry year. If so, there are some genetics that are going to perform better under dry conditions.

“The more specific you can tailor that variety mix to your specific field and put in different options in there, you’re spreading out that risk,” says Yott.

the overall value of the spend instead of seeing only the negative connotation.

“A lot of us aren’t looking at cost per acre anymore but opportunity per acre, and asking: ‘What’s the top end?’ or ‘How many bushels per thousand plants?’” poses Yott. “It’s not just how much did it cost, it’s determining the value of that top-end. And if I can invest a dollar more, can I get three dollars back? If I can do that, then it’s a good investment. That’s not always about cost as much as opportunity.”

Some just want results For all of these advances, Brian Woolley contends that there are other considerations to be made to the prescr iptive — or decision-or iented approach of today. Woolley spent years on the crop protection side. As an agronomic sales representative with Syngenta

In the past, farmers went to their suppliers “for” information. Now they go “with” information.

That makes it a whole new world Changing attitudes Yott also sees a trend or a streamlining effect taking shape — one where there used to be four or five types of growers, including so-called hand-wringers or those who wanted only the newest technology. Now, he says, conditions in agriculture are causing a kind of distillation down to two basic approaches. The first is made up of those growers who listen to the likes of Dr. Fred Below from the University of Illinois, who advocates investing in production through variety selection, fertility plans and timely applications. The second is that segment who want the best price, whether they have a consulting agronomist to help them with their cropping plan, or they’ve done their own work and are confident they can bring the crop along themselves.

“And it’s not young versus old, it’s not big versus small, it’s really ‘we’re going to spend our way to reach the top end,’ or ‘we’re going to try to save our way,’” says Yott. “They can be quite different in mindset when they’re looking at that value piece or that agronomic and solutions approach.”

It’s also a matter of wording: sometimes inputs, equipment — even the seed — need to be regarded as an investment versus only being a cost. Look at 38

Canada, he’s had to immerse himself in the seed side of the agri-marketing sphere. And for all of the opportunities that the technology and research are pointing to for farmers, he concedes there are those who just look at the latest results from either the provincial performance trials or a company’s catalogue, and default to what they want.

“It comes down to the conversation with the grower, and let’s drill down to what the grower needs and wants, and what’s best for that farm,” says Woolley.

“Those are the conversations we want to have. I don’t think this (prescriptive approach) is all that novel an idea, it’s more a case of maybe the terms are new, and they envelop a lot of what’s going on in agriculture today, where we have a focus on the soil, a more prescriptive fertilizer blend, populations or row width.

There’s much more to it than just selecting the hybrid or the variety.”

Woolley also agrees that the days of “mass appeal” product launches are a thing of the past, and Syngenta is a perfect example. Years ago, the seed division — NK Seeds — was based north of London while crop protection products came out of the Honeywood Farm near Plattsville, and product launches at either location were treated separately. Today, the two research facilities operate in concert.

“We don’t have these big launch days, and when we do bring growers to a plot, we don’t just have one or two varieties at these plots. We have a myriad of selections, and we don’t talk solely about the hybrid or the variety,” says Woolley. “A lot of the time, we’re joining that with a discussion about fungicides or row width or population, and really drilling down on the agronomics of a variety or hybrid.”

Even in discussions about the company’s plots, the focus isn’t always about yield. Instead, it’s about working behind the scenes on improving conditions in the field, to figure out the best approach before reaching the point of talking about the variety with growers and dealers. There’s more information involved and more time spent in discussion with more people, be it sales reps or biologists, with everyone working together on a prescriptive approach that really helps the grower.

Looking to the future, Woolley believes the industry will see much the same pattern of “introduction” followed by “familiarization/incorporation” that has come with GPS and other equipment trends.

The same was the case for Bt corn hybrids and glyphosate-tolerant soybean varieties, where introduction has given way to familiarity and maximizing performance. He says we’ll keep seeing more varieties and hybrids being launched, followed by a learning curve with their uses, and then the phase where growers learn to manipulate the many different parameters to improve production.

An example of this is seeing the rise of fungicides as growth promoters in corn and wheat. Yes, they do a very good job in protecting against diseases, but the delayed maturity benefit has only come to light in the last five to eight years, and there’s an ongoing learning curve associated with that practice (including the potential for the development of resistance and new active ingredients).

“If you get the chance to sit down with the grower and talk varieties and hybrids, there’s far more to what we’re talking about,” says Woolley. “And more growers are becoming in tune with what they need. They’re getting their soils analyzed or working with a consultant to really understand the potential response in their fields to what they can do with herbicide, seed, in-season protection and micronutrients.” SG Soybean Guide, February 2015

Soybean guide

For soybeans to take over in the West, they’ll need to nudge pulses aside.

Taking pulse P

ulses are among Canada’s crop success stories, with strong agronomics and dynamite market opportunities.

But a new challenger is trying to win acres away from pulses, and yes, that challenge is extremely well established in other parts of North America and around the globe, which means this might become an interesting family fight.

But the pulse industry is confident it has what it takes to hold on to its piece of the pie.

Although soybeans might be competing with pulses for acreage, their food use is not at all the same. And that makes all the difference in the world, according to marketers.

Pulse crops hit the ground running in the 1970s. They filled a need among farmers for a marketable crop that, when added to the farm rotation, also helped in the battle against weeds, disease and pests. Like soybeans, pulses are legumes, and farmers appreciated their ability to fix nitrogen.

By 1995, some 2.5 million acres of dry beans, peas, lentils and chickpeas were being seeded. Last year, the land seeded to all pulses and special crops in Canada reached 8.5 million acres, or about 13 per cent of total seeded acreage.

“We believe there’s room for pulses,” says Carl Potts, executive director of Saskatchewan Pulse Growers, and he points to expected strong sales growth owing to consumers interested in healthy foods.

Potts’s organization is fixing its sights on new markets and new uses for pulses in a bid to expand the market base and reach the potential of 25 per cent of Canadian crop acreage. Canada ships pulses to almost 150 countries, but a small few (India, China, Bangladesh) account for a very large share.

Gord Bacon is chief executive officer of Pulse Canada, and as he sees it, we’ve just started to scratch the surface of all that pulses can be.

“Our traditional markets for pulses and traditional forms of consumption are of huge importance to farmers and the rest of the Canadian pulse industry,” says Bacon. “Part of our focus is on improving efficiencies in the system — making sure that what we do now, we do really well.”

Bacon says tackling transportation issues is one example of how Pulse Canada will continue to get involved in activities and partnerships that assist the core marketing work headed up by Canada’s farmers, processors and exporters. Through the Canadian Special Crops Association, Pulse Canada aims to address the significant transportation challenges that pulses, like other crops, experienced this past year by monitoring and measuring system performance and improving the level of service.

The federal government is reviewing the national Transportation Act, and pulse associations are involved.

But the focus that really lights a fire under Pulse Canada these days is food product innovation. Bacon says this entails looking at pulses from the perspective of both what the consumer wants and what the consumer needs. Pulses have the science to achieve breakthroughs in nutrition, blood sugar health, allergenicity, and the environmental sustainability of food products.

Soybean Guide, February 2015

These farmers say, don’t bet on it

By Pat Keena Pulses are showing up in all kinds of foods, and that’s one reason why acreage is set to grow. In 2012, Bacon says, 304 new food products were launched in Canada and the U.S. that contained pulses, either in whole or in fractions or distillates. In 2013, there were 709 new pulse products, and the number is expected to show another increase when 2014 numbers are released.

Health Canada is said to be on the verge of approving a health claim linking pulse foods to reduced heart disease and diabetes.

All of this is very exciting as the pulse industry readies itself for the United Nations International Year of Pulses in 2016.

Still, Pulse Canada says it isn’t in competition with soybeans, and Bacon says co-operation between the two crops will yield benefits for both, so when Soy Canada, the new national association dedicated to soybeans, was announced in September 2014, Manitoba Pulse Growers joined its board.

“We believe there’s room for pulses to take 25 per cent or more of Canada’s total seeded acreage.”

— Carl Potts, Saskatchewan Pulse Growers Pulse research is trying to stay ahead of the curve so pulses continue to be the crop of choice. Dr. Sabine Banniza at the University of Saskatchewan notes that researchers have been effective in dealing with canopy diseases, such as ascochyta blight in chickpeas and lentils, as well as anthracnose in lentils. Research is also looking at solving stemphylium blight in lentils by exploring a wild relative and understanding how its resistance genes might be easily moved into cultivated varieties.

Banniza says researchers are also trying to create a better defence against root rot in peas and lentils. Once infected, there is nothing that can be done for the crops, nor can current seed treatments prevent infection.

Perhaps not coincidentally, regions of southeastern Saskatchewan have seen more acres turned over to soybeans. The same is true in southwestern Manitoba where more soybeans are being seeded because of earlier varieties. Ontario remains Canada’s largest soybean producer but in 2014 Manitoba’s production grew to 18 per cent of the total.

But Canada’s buyers continue to be positive about pulses.

Margaret Hughes, co-owner of Best Cooking Pulses, with plants in Portage la Prairie and Regina, says pulses are showing up in more and more cereals, baked goods and pasta. Pulses are also launching in grain-free pet foods with significant success.

“Funding from the Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta Pulse Growers, in concert with the Canadian government, has increased research into pulses,” Hughes says. “Pulse Canada now has the marketing ammunition it needs to promote pulses throughout the Canadian food industry.” SG 39

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A M E - ma n a g eme n t

Finance metrics you may not have thought of — operating efficiency

By Larry Martin and Heather Broughton n good times or bad, there are some basic financial tools that allow farmers (and other managers) to gauge their operating efficiency, diagnose where they have problems, and measure the financial risk they are bearing or are about to undertake when they make a substantial investment.

We find, however, that we hear very few people talking about these tools or how to use them.

This is the first of a three-part series that will address some of those basic tools. Because of space restrictions, we need to limit the amount of accounting definition that’s included. Be sure to get detailed information when you try this at home.

pare different years and, when appropriate, benchmark against other producers who may have very different debt structures than ours.

After deducting depreciation and interest we get earnings before taxes, and then we deduct taxes to give net income after taxes.

The next-to-last line is an interesting one. This is where you put all that stuff really not related to your core farm operation. This would include government payments, payments for driving a school bus, custom work if it’s not core, and the expenses incurred to soup up your pickup truck for racing on Saturday night (as well as the prize money that you win!).

EBITDA

Operating efficiency

The financial measures discussed in these articles are based in whole or part on the concept of Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization (EBITDA). This is a long-winded way of describing operating income, or what you have left after you pay your operating expenses and before you deduct your cost of capital. For some reason, this measure, used constantly in business in other industries, is not talked about very much in agriculture. It’s a pity, because it’s so useful.

Below is a 14-line representation of a farm’s income (operating) statement. We divide costs into six categories. Subtracting direct crop and livestock expenses from gross revenue gives gross margin. Then subtracting operating costs such as labour, machinery operating expenses and land rent gives what we call contribution margin. Then, by subtracting the farm’s overhead expenses, we get EBITDA. Gross Operating Revenue (-) Crop and Livestock Expenses (=) Gross Margin (-) Labour, Machine Operating Expenses, Land Rent (=) Contribution Margin (-) Management, Office and Overhead Expenses (=) EBITDA (-) Depreciation/Amortization (=) EBIT (-) Interest (=) Earnings Before Taxes (-) Taxes (=) Earnings After Taxes (+/-) Non-Core Income and Expenses (=) Net Income Notice that all of the expenses deducted to get to EBITDA are operating expenses; they don’t directly include the cost of capital. We want to separate them completely from capital expenses, so we can com-

This approach makes it relatively easy to standardize financial statements using the definitions of the cost categories. Often with farm data, we can get good benchmarks for well-managed farms. What is “well managed?” It is an operation that is efficient at generating operating income. This gives rise to a very useful ratio to measure “operating efficiency.”

If we simply divide EBITDA by gross operating revenue, the ratio measures how many cents of operating income are generated by the farm per dollar of gross revenue. Lots of data from both Canada and the U.S. shows that for most crop and livestock farms, the ratio should be 35 per cent or higher (usually averaged over a number of years). In other words, after paying all operating expenses, the farm should have $0.35 left per dollar of gross revenue.

Work done several years ago by Al Mussel at the George Morris Centre showed that there is huge variation in this measure among Canadian farm tax filers, but that the ranges aren’t much different whether they are beef, hog, cash grain or dairy farms, or whether they are large or small operations.

The average was 22 per cent, far lower than our benchmark. At the same time, all groups had a number of farms which were at or above the benchmark.

Farms chronically below 25 per cent are generally not growing and not overly successful. Those with ratios below 20 per cent are often in difficulty.

For farms that do not achieve the benchmark, there are some further benchmarks to help diagnose what the problem is. We will focus on these in the second of this series of articles. CG

february 17, 2015

Larry Martin is co-owner and lead instructor in AME’s management training courses. Heather Broughton is co-owner and president of AME. country-guide.ca 27

business

Executive privilege The management performance of corporate CEOs falls when they are overcompensated. Does the same apply to farmers?

By Scott Garvey, CG Machinery Editor here is one undeniable fact underlying farm equipment sales all around the world. When farm incomes rise, machinery sales numbers rocket right along with them. Higher farm profits are reinvested, with producers willing to spend money and even take on debt, especially on equipment.

Farm fleets do need to be regularly updated, of course, but record farm incomes since 2008 have fuelled unprecedented spending on new machinery, just as they have also pushed farmland values and land rental rates to record highs as well.

But farm commodity prices and farm incomes are notoriously fluid.

So the question is, do those periods of high incomes create a kind of euphoria or recklessness that induces farm managers to make long-term financial decisions that could seriously reduce profits in future years, especially if revenues fall?

A recent study suggests it may.

Michael J. Cooper of the University of Utah, Huseyin Gulen of Purdue University, and P. Raghavendra Rau of the University of Cambridge in the U.K. looked at the link between the compensation packages paid to CEOs and their company’s performance. They co-authored a report and published their findings in October, 2014.

The researchers surveyed 1,500 major corporations, analysed their financial performance and correlated that to the amount of money their CEOs pocketed in a year.

Granted, most farmers aren’t CEOs of structured multinationals, but all farmers get their compensation package based on the performance of their operation, and they are the ones making investment decisions. So there is a strong parallel.

And to add to that similarity, in recent times most CEO compensation packages have been linked directly to the performance of their company’s stock. The thinking is that this creates an incentive to perform. The better their management decisions and the higher dividends that stockholders see, the better the CEO’s paycheque.

It sounds logical, but apparently there is a risk. When you overpay CEOs, they start to make investment decisions that negatively affect the future performance of their firms.

“We find evidence that chief executive officer (CEO) pay is negatively related to future stock returns for periods up to three years after sorting on pay,” reads the report. “Our results appear to be driven by high pay-related CEO overconfidence that leads to shareholder wealth losses from activities such as overinvestment and value-destroying mergers and acquisitions.”

Forbes annually surveys the top-earning CEOs in the United States. It not only tallies up the pay packets each executive takes to the bank, it also looks at the performance of the company under that person’s leadership, measuring it against simi-

Lower-paid CEO’s, including Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett consistently outperform CEOs with the biggest total incomes, new study finds.

28 country-guide.ca

February 17, 2015

business

lar firms, and then giving the CEO an efficiency rating.

The problem is, the pay and efficiency rates on the Forbes scale don’t exactly mesh the way that the compensation theory would lead you to expect, which seems to lend support to that study on pay versus performance.

Here’s an example.

In Forbes’ 2012 top earners list, the No. 1 wage-earning CEO was John H. Hammergren of McKesson (a health care and pharmaceuticals company). He collected an eye-watering US$131.19 million. But the efficiency rating Forbes gave him based on his company’s performance was a decidedly middle-ofthe-road 121.

On the F orbes scale 1 is best and 206 is the worst.

In contrast to that, you have to leaf through to number 495 on the list to find Warren J. Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. Buffett — if you really haven’t heard of him — is considered by nearly everyone to be an investment genius.

Buffett’s corporate compensation package totalled a measly US$490,000 in the year of the survey. Of course, at the time he owned what F orbes estimated was more than US$44 billion in company stock, but either way, he gets an impressive efficiency rating of 33, despite finishing nearly last on Forbes’ top 500 earners list.

That CEO compensation study should provide producers with a new metric to consider when they evaluate their own management performance this winter, especially after we’ve just gone through a few years of record commodity prices — at least in the grain and oilseeds sector. How have higher incomes affected their decision-making? Have they taken more high-risk financial gambles? Have they overinvested in machinery, land or anything else that will drag down future profits?

How would they rate on something like Forbes’ efficiency scale? CG

February 17, 2015

One of the most controversial topics in the relationship between corporations and their shareholders in recent years has been the compensation packages awarded to senior executives and, most significantly, CEOs (chief executive officers).

With so many CEOs now raking in incredibly large pay packets, a few investors have asked if the term “corporate raider” should take on a whole new meaning.

When it comes to ag equipment manufacturers, we took a look at the majorbrand CEOs to see where they land in the world of executive compensation.

Starting with Samuel Allen, CEO of John Deere, the company’s 2013 proxy filing with the SEC (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission) shows his total compensation package for that fiscal year, including wages, benefits and stocks, netted him US$19,148,372. The other four top executives whose salaries were declared in the filing picked up in excess of US$4 million each.

According to glassdoor.com, a website that lists pay scales, a middle-of-theroad engineer at John Deere gets paid an annual salary in the mid-US$70,000 range. So in one year Allen makes an amount equal to the combined annual earnings of about 255 of his engineers.

Looked at another way, in one year Allen makes the same amount that seven engineers would earn in their entire careers (at that constant pay rate).

To his credit, according to the Wall S treet J ournal , Allen actually asked for a 25 per cent reduction in his cash bonus this year because of a tightening up of market conditions. That dropped his annual earnings by about US$1.8 million.

Despite that, his 2014 earnings still hit US$20.3 million.

The paper cites a proxy filing by Deere in mid-December as the source of that information. That filing wasn’t yet on Deere’s investor website at the time of this writing.

Over at AGCO, its SEC proxy filing notified investors of a stockholder meeting held in April of 2014, in which shareholders would be asked to approve, among other things, CEO, Martin Richenhagen’s 2013 pay packet. All totalled, his full compensation for fiscal 2013 fell in at $11,742,360.

That proxy filing contained a summary of the brand’s “(executive) compensation

Photo: AGCO Corporation

What ag equipment CEOs are worth

Earning $11.7 million in 2013, AGCO’s Martin Richenhagen is far from the top. philosophy and program design.” Here is how the company says it structured its senior executives’ compensation program. “(It) is intended to support the company’s business strategy and align executives’ interests with those of stockholders and employees (i.e. pay for performance)... The company believes that as an executive’s responsibilities increase, so should the proportion of his or her total pay comprised of annual incentive cash bonuses and long-term incentive compensation, which supports and reinforces the company’s pay-forperformance philosophy.”

That has become a relatively common approach for major corporations.

Finally, CNH, which includes the New Holland and Case IH brands. It’s part of the Fiat Industrial group of companies. Its 2012 SEC filing shows CEO Sergio Marchionne took in “renumeration” of approx.

C$4.06 million and equity renumeration with a “fair value” of C$8.72 million in that year (making a total of C$12.78 million with exchange rate at press time).

Despite the enormity of these numbers, the three ag equipment brand CEOs actually earn modest incomes, relatively speaking. They don’t even come close to the top of the Forbes survey of highest paid executive salaries. Fashion icon Ralph Lauren, No. 2 on the Forbes list, pulled US$66.65 million out of his company in 2012. Even the head of Starbucks doubles Allen’s numbers.

country-guide.ca 29

business

30 country-guide.ca

February 17, 2015

business

Who needs equipment?

The Suhrs are making it pay to crop 7,000 acres with only a pickup. The rest is all custom

Photography: David Charlesworth

By Ralph Pearce, CG Production Editor ome people look at conventional farming and organic production and they see oil and water. The two just were not made to mix.

Not only are their production methods about as different as they can be, so too are their markets.

Fiete Suhr assures anyone who holds that outlook that not only is it possible to combine the two, he’s been doing it successfully for nearly 15 years.

What makes this story even more remarkable, however, is that on the conventional side, he’s been doing it all with custom operators. He doesn’t own any of his own equipment.

Suhr farms on different parcels of land in Bruce County, with his home farm located between Port Elgin and Paisley, Ont. along the Saugeen River. It’s a parcel of 100 acres that he purchased in 2000 after the farming operation he worked for went into receivership.

“For what we were looking for, it had everything,” says Suhr, who grew up on a farm in Germany and then emigrated to Canada in 1983. “It had water, a bush and beautiful cropland, and we found it with a nice house on it. So we bought that as a starting point.”

At first, Suhr and his wife, Irene Kollmann considered starting a community-supported

agriculture (CSA) farm, where shares in the operation could be sold and crops would be grown to meet the preferences of the shareholders. For a small farm, Suhr says, a CSA approach can be a good fit, but it’s also a lot of work requiring a lot of organization.

Almost immediately, however, an opportunity came up to rent 4,000 acres of land through some investors Suhr had worked with from Europe. So instead of developing a CSA, they headed into 2001 with a decision to start cash cropping.

Through the years, he’s had a lot of help from Irene, who acts as Suhr’s sounding board and counsel on the crucial decisions pertaining to the farm. Irene studied agriculture in Vienna, Austria, and finished with her doctorate, so she’s usually the first person he turns to for advice.

During peak times in the growing season, she also helps with the day-to-day operations.

“With my previous job, I had a lot of connections to custom operators who could farm it for me, because I didn’t want to invest millions of dollars in capital without being sure that I’d have the land long term,” says Suhr, adding that he is now at 7,200 acres of rented land and 700 acres of land that is owned and dedicated to organic production.

Continued on page 32

Trait Stewardship Responsibilities Notice to Farmers Monsanto Company is a member of Excellence Through Stewardship® (ETS). Monsanto products are commercialized in accordance with ETS Product Launch Stewardship Guidance, and in compliance with Monsanto’s Policy for Commercialization of Biotechnology-Derived Plant Products in Commodity Crops. Commercialized products have been approved for import into key export markets with functioning regulatory systems. Any crop or material produced from this product can only be exported to, or used, processed or sold in countries where all necessary regulatory approvals have been granted. It is a violation of national and international law to move material containing biotech traits across boundaries into nations where import is not permitted. Growers should talk to their grain handler or product purchaser to confirm their buying position for this product. Excellence Through Stewardship® is a registered trademark of Excellence Through Stewardship.

ALWAYS READ AND FOLLOW PESTICIDE LABEL DIRECTIONS. Roundup Ready® crops contain genes that confer tolerance to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup® brand agricultural herbicides. Roundup® brand agricultural herbicides will kill crops that are not tolerant to glyphosate. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for canola contains the active ingredients difenoconazole, metalaxyl (M and S isomers), fludioxonil, and thiamethoxam. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for soybeans (fungicides only) is a combination of three separate individually registered products, which together contain the active ingredients fluxapyroxad, pyraclostrobin and metalaxyl. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for soybeans (fungicides and insecticide) is a combination of four separate individually registered products, which together contain the active ingredients fluxapyroxad, pyraclostrobin, metalaxyl and imidacloprid. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for corn (fungicides only) is a combination of three separate individually-registered products, which together contain the active ingredients metalaxyl, trifloxystrobin and ipconazole. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for corn (fungicides and insecticide) is a combination of four separate individually-registered products, which together contain the active ingredients metalaxyl, trifloxystrobin, ipconazole, and clothianidin. Acceleron® seed treatment technology for corn with Poncho®/VoTivo™ (fungicides, insecticide and nematicide) is a combination of five separate individually-registered products, which together contain the active ingredients metalaxyl, trifloxystrobin, ipconazole, clothianidin and Bacillus firmus strain I-5821. Acceleron®, Acceleron and Design®, DEKALB and Design®, DEKALB®, Genuity and Design®, Genuity®, RIB Complete and Design®, RIB Complete®, Roundup Ready 2 Technology and Design®, Roundup Ready 2 Yield®, Roundup Ready®, Roundup Transorb®, Roundup WeatherMAX®, Roundup®, SmartStax and Design®, SmartStax®, Transorb®, VT Double PRO® and VT Triple PRO® are trademarks of Monsanto Technology LLC. Used under license. LibertyLink® and the Water Droplet Design are trademarks of Bayer. Used under license. Herculex® is a registered trademark of Dow AgroSciences LLC. Used under license. Poncho® and Votivo™ are trademarks of Bayer. Used under license.

All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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country-guide.ca 31

business Continued from page 31 And on the conventional side of the operation, the only equipment he owns is his pickup truck, and his phone.

As for soil types, Suhr says three-quarters of the land he works is clay-loam, with the rest being silt-loam or sandy-loam. About 30 per cent of the land in total is systematically tiled, and that can raise some challenges from year to year.

In terms of cropping, Suhr’s mainstays on the conventional side are corn, wheat and soybeans — all grown under identitypreserved (IP) conditions, so he plants no genetically modified hybrids or varieties.

Occasionally he’ll also plant edible beans — usually white but he’s also tried black beans and adzukis in the past. And he’s grown spring and winter canola as well as spring wheat.

“On the organic side, it’s a little different: I grow corn, soybeans, spelt, oats, sunflower, peas, some flax and hay and as much as I can, utilize cover crops, as well,” says Suhr, adding that from a machinery perspective in the organic side of the operation, he owns his tillage and weed

management equipment. “And I do have a small sheep flock with about 100 ewes.”

He’s trying to match the livestock component to the acreage for the organic production, adding that he may need to expand in order to meet those nutrient needs. He’s also purchasing organic compost until he has the flock built up.

The challenges Farming on its own is enough to create some rather imposing challenges. But mixing conventional production with organic — and then adding a reliance on custom operators to that combination — would seem to risk a nightmare of complications.

Yet Suhr takes these in stride, crediting his experience as a farm manager on an operation which was also based on custom operators.

“I’ve built that relationship over 20 years,” Suhr says, adding that he deals almost exclusively with one custom operator. “I have a long-term relationship with them that’s built on friendship and trust, and they’ve built up to meet my needs, so it’s a win for both of us.”

Business plans can reflect the farmer’s strengths, Suhr believes. With his background in economics, his plan is based on managing the numbers

32 country-guide.ca

From an organizational perspective, Suhr doesn’t believe relying on custom work to be any more difficult than buying the equipment and hiring the staff he would need to operate it for him. He suggests it might even be a little easier, as long as you can create a relationship with a custom operator who is reliable.

If he owned half of his acreage and knew the long-term outlook, Suhr says he would definitely have his own equipment. But such decisions have to be carefully calculated.

There’s the potential disadvantage that if he supplied his own machinery, he could be building equity, rather than simply writing cheques. For now, though, he’s content to maintain his current business model.

“The main challenge is the co-ordinating — that’s No. 1,” says Suhr. “It’s the same with the big cash croppers.”

Looking forward, marketing is another potential issue, “especially since there’s more uncertainty in the market now than there was maybe 20 years ago,” Suhr says. “The fluctuations are higher, the demand is changing so much quicker — with China coming on so strong — and the uncertainty is increasing.”

Attitude adjustment Suhr sees opportunity in those marketing and organizational challenges.

In fact, he sees it as a core management trait to search for the opportunity side of situations as they evolve, and then to adapt production and marketing to take advantage.

For Suhr, you might think this would be more difficult because of his reliance on custom work. After all, if he is paying custom for much of the work he needs, then he has some limits on his ability to totally manage his cost of production. (Of course, Suhr might respond that no one has absolute freedom. If you are leasing, or if you have title to the machinery, you still need to make the payments.)

But the bigger point may be this.

From his point of view, Suhr’s management system enables him to diversify his cropping between organic and conventional, which in turn spreads his risks and creates new opportunities to be proactive.

“It’s opportunity, that’s the biggest challenge,” says Suhr. “The organic gives me some risk management — a second leg to stand on. It acts differently than February 17, 2015

business the conventional market, and it gives me some flexibility and risk protection.”

One of the strengths required for production of this type, he adds, is patience, especially working with custom operators. There will be the odd day, he says, when he really wants to get the crop harvested, yet the combine might not show up on schedule because the custom operator is a field or two behind. That means it’ll be there the next day, and Suhr needs the patience to work with that.

“I can be patient because I know these people who are working with me are doing their best to accommodate me, and it’s a great relationship that has been grown,” says Suhr. “I am patient with them and they are patient with me — it’s a give and take.”

The other unique quality that Suhr brings to his farming operation is this oneof-a-kind business blend. With his experience in both conventional and organic production, he’s impossible to pigeon-hole as one or the other, because he’s both.

“I learn a lot — I go to all of these conferences as much as possible, and I go to

the same on the organic side, as much as possible,” he says, noting it’s not a matter of one or the other; there has to be room for both. “There are strengths on both sides, and it’s a synergy that helps me, and I think it’s better because you get some of the good of the conventional and some of the good of the organic.”

On a personal note, Suhr views the organic system as a better plan to follow, in the long term. At the same time, he’s not judgmental about that perspective.

The future will tell farmers which way is the best, he says, and the voice of the consumer telling growers what they want will create a sense of direction.

Whether it’s a consumer base that demands an end to gestation crates in sow barns or the end of neonicotinoid insecticides in corn and soybean production, farmers need to be more open to whatever kind of production practices consumers demand, Suhr says. The only stipulation is that farmers must be paid for that value-added management.

“As a consumer, if you want to have an impact on agriculture, buy or ask for what

you believe in,” says Suhr. “Don’t just complain and still buy what’s provided.”

Should other farmers go this way?

Asked if he advocates other farmers trying his approach, Suhr responds that success lies not only in diligence and attitude, but in your own skilset.

His background is in economics, so he likes working with numbers. But other farmers have their own individual strengths, and those strengths have to be woven into their business planning.

Above all, says Suhr, there has to be a drive to succeed that creates an attitude that success is achievable, if not inevitable.

“You sit down, you make your business plan, and see what works for you,” says Suhr. “The key is you have to believe in what you’re doing. As long as you believe in it and the numbers work out, that’s the way you should go.”

“You need a strategy,” Suhr says.

“Then follow it and do it, and you will be more successful, as long as you do it and do it with passion.” CG

Wm. A. Stewart Lecture

An evening with one of the most influential people in Canadian sport.

MARK COHON – 12th commissioner of the CFL A Career in Leadership 7 p.m., Thursday, March 26, 2015 London Convention Centre Tickets $100 Tickets available at bit.ly/StewartLecture2015 or by calling 519-826-4204 Presenting Sponsor: The Wm. A. Stewart Lecture & Reception is partially funded by the Wm. A. Stewart Endowment. Proceeds from this event support the Advanced Agricultural Leadership Program (AALP).

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2015-01-15 11:13 AM

business

More to marketing than price

By Gerald Pilger ithout a doubt, the biggest fallacy about Canada’s grain producers is that they are good marketers.

I would argue instead that few grain growers actually have real marketing expertise, and even fewer actually market what they produce.

Grain producers who have spent many hours or days attending marketing groups, courses, and seminars along with the many farm advisers, brokers, market specialists, and educators who offer them will disagree. So will farmers who are inundated with market information via online sources, from newsletters, subscription services, direct mail, on-air radio broadcasts and even person-to-person contact with buyers, brokers, and advisers.

It’s also true: most growers do follow the “market” closely. Successful farmers understand and probably employ a host of marketing tools including storage, contracting, futures, basis, targets, options and deferred delivery. A percentage of producers even sell and replace the physical commodities with paper under the guise of marketing rather than realizing they are actually making an investment or speculating (which is what such actions actually are, and what they should be evaluated as).

The problem is that nearly all this effort is focused almost entirely on capturing a price. But price is only one part of marketing.

In fact, some business gurus argue that price setting is the least important component of marketing. Your product’s qualities, how you make it available to your customer and how they perceive your product are likely more important than price for long-term profitability.

True marketing consists of ensuring you are offering the consumer the right product, in the right place, at the right time, at the right price. Marketing requires not only the setting of a price, but also understanding and responding to the wants and needs of the customer.

Is your farm business — and is the Canadian agricultural industry — actually offering the right product in the right place at the right time at the right price? How well are we as farmers and as an industry actually marketing what we grow and produce?

Branding commodities Unfortunately, nearly all Canadian farm production is in undifferentiated commodities. Farmers tend to perceive little difference between a bin of a specific crop that they grow and a bin of the same grain of a neighbour, or of the same crop grown in the U.S., Brazil or Australia, for that matter. Wheat is wheat and corn is corn after all. They are relatively easy to 34 country-guide.ca

grow worldwide and similar types are used for the same purposes no matter where they are grown or where they are processed.

Unfortunately, producers of undifferentiated commodities have very few marketing tools they can use to compete for sales and market share. In a free and open market with a large number of sellers, price becomes the primary way to market a commodity. As a result, commodities are defined by prices continually trending down because producers not only compete on low prices but also increase production and supply in an attempt to compensate for lower prices.

But growers have another option. Rather than staying on the commodity treadmill and continually chasing prices lower, it is possible to differentiate a commodity.

According to Dave Dolak, a marketing expert from Charlottesville, Virginia, “The answer lies in first identifying or devising ways to create unique attributes and unique promises of value offered solely by you and your product offering.”

That sounds like a mouthful.

When asked if it is possible to do this for a commodity crop such as wheat, Dolak replies: “definitely!” He points to coffee as an example of a crop where companies and countries have used differentiation and branding to increase their market share and price. Columbian coffee and Kona brand coffee have become recognized brands, and consumers look for those labels when purchasing.

Dolak has written a short e-book entitled “How to Brand and Market a Commodity” which gives a step-by-step process that commodity producers, companies, and countries can use to differentiate a commodity and compete for market share on something other than price. The e-book is available through Amazon.com.

“Commodity marketers are often very surprised to learn from customers that price is not the most important factor — let alone the only factor,” Dolak says.

Canadian wheat A useful case study is Western Canadian wheat. Dr. Rex Newkirk is vice-president of research and innovation at the Canadian International Grains Institute (Cigi) in Winnipeg. He explains that Cigi has been instrumental in the development and maintenance of export markets for Canadian grain for many years by providing buyers of Canadian wheat with technical training on the milling, processing and utilization of that wheat.

Cigi’s work was complemented by the analysis and assurances of wheat quality provided by the Canadian Grain Commission and the identification Continued on page 36 February 17, 2015

business Continued from page 34 of market and export opportunities by the Canadian Wheat Board. Together these three organizations created a brand for Western Canadian wheat. That brand identified Canadian wheat as very high quality, safe, clean and wholesome grain, and it assured customers that wheat from Canada would meet or surpass their expectations.

The effort succeeded, Newkirk says.

“Canada had a strong brand for its wheat.”

However, the change to the CWB in 2012 has had a negative impact on that brand. There may have been expectations that the private trade would ensure our brand is maintained, but there have been problems. Buyers have reported being disappointed with cleanliness and quality in a number of shipments. They had even bigger concerns with the shipping delays last winter. In a world of just-in-time delivery, our brand was degraded by the inability of companies to deliver on time because of their difficulties in sourcing the specific quality requested by a buyer, rail movement problems, and delays in loading vessels.

In order to rebuild the tarnished wheat brand, Newkirk says, Team Canada was developed. Cereals Canada, provincial grain commissions, exporters, and individual farmers are now joining Cigi and CGC in actively marketing all grains. It is hoped by including people from every level of the value chain on trade missions to importing countries, we can assure buyers in those countries of the quality and value of Canadian grains.

Lynn Jacobson, a farmer from Enchant, Alta., took part in the Team Canada mission to Asia last fall. He was very direct in his comments about Canada’s wheat brand. “Over the last few years, no one had been branding Canadian wheat. Canadians had not been making visits to millers and they (the millers) were not happy about this. You cannot sell wheat with just a phone call…

Skype is not a face-to-face meeting.”

Adds Jacobson: “U.S. Wheat Associates, the Australians and the Russians are meeting with Asian buyers regularly, and we have to go there too if we are to compete in those markets.”

Even more importantly, it is hoped the

The 4 Ps Business theory breaks the job of marketing into four components, referred to as the Marketing Mix or the 4 Ps. These components are product, place, promotion, and price.

Any business which does not address all four of these components is setting itself up for failure in the long run.

If you are truly a good marketer you should also be addressing all four of these sectors, and you should be able to answer the following questions for whatever you produce:

Product • What does the customer want and need from what I produce?

• What specific features add value to what I produce?

• How will the customer use what I produce?

• What quality or factor is missing or lacking from my production?

• How is it different than what my competitors are producing?

Place • How can a customer see and know what I am producing?

• How will I deliver what I am producing to the customer?

• Are there alternative delivery channels to get my production to the customer?

• Who will be my sales force and how will they meet with the customer?

• How are my competitors approaching and selling to customers?

• Can I provide better service or delivery than my competitors?

Promotion • How will my production be promoted to customers?

• When will I promote my production?

• How do my competitors promote their production?

Price • What is my cost of production, delivery, and service to customers?

• What is the value of my production to my customer?

• How will my price compare to competitors’?

• What impact will a small increase or decrease in price have on sales?

36 country-guide.ca

Team Canada approach will provide better feedback of what our customers are demanding.

Jacobson brought back an extremely important message for producers. “Millers are now complaining about quality of Canadian wheat,” he reports. “The only advantage Canada has is our wheat’s quality. If we ever go away from quality we will lose markets. If we don’t have quality, even the U.S. market will disappear. We will become a residual seller of wheat if we do not supply what the customer wants.”

As an example, Jacobson notes that buyers have been concerned about the gluten strength of our wheat for the last few years. He notes gluten strength varies between varieties, yet some of the most popular varieties we grow have low gluten strength. Even so, we continue to grow these varieties because of their agronomics and high yields.

The fact that these varieties are not meeting the needs of our customers is feedback that farmers must get and act upon.

Jacobson hopes the Team Canada approach will deliver this feedback to farmers.

Canada has worked hard to build a very favourable brand for our wheat.

Until recently our wheat could be considered as Perrier compared to tap water.

But to maintain that image will take a lot of work, especially by producers.

We cannot expect multinational grain companies to spend money to tell buyers that Canada has the best wheat in the world when they are also trying to sell wheat from other wheat-exporting nations. Branding of wheat ultimately falls on the producer, and it will be the effort that producers put into true marketing that determines whether Canadian wheat maintains its differentiation as the highest quality in the world, or if we lose this positioning to lower-cost producers.

Interestingly, Dolak also points out that countries like China, Korea, and India are increasingly using branding techniques to differentiate and market the commodities that they produce. It would be a real shame if Canada and Canadian producers lose our Canadian wheat brand to other countries because they are better marketers than us.

Make no mistake, using all available pricing tools to lock in a price is a critical, necessary skill for farmers. But this alone is not marketing. As farmers and industry, we must do more to actually market our grains rather than just price them. CG February 17, 2015

See the lAteSt in the FielD

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machinery

Manufacturing talent Executives at the major equipment manufacturers know their brands can’t succeed without the right people on the payroll

By Scott Garvey, CG Machinery Editor mong the Big Four farm equipment brands, John Deere owns the largest slice of the North American market, and the bosses at its world headquarters in Moline, Illinois, have no intention of letting that change any time soon. In December they revealed their updated, long-term corporate strategy to investors, outlining how they intend to keep the green brand out in front of the pack.

That strategy includes the usual. It promises to keep inventory costs down, to keep earnings ratios up, etc., etc., etc.

But it also includes a core focus that might not seem so expected, i.e. recruiting, developing and retaining the right people.

Nor is this just a tip of the hat to make the company’s workforce feel valued. Instead, it is a plan, and the objective to “grow extraordinary global talent” couldn’t be given higher profile, being identified as one of the four key factors that John Deere must score big on in order to achieve its overall long-term strategy.

Deere isn’t alone. In fact, if you talk to any senior executive at any equipment brand, you’ll find they are working as hard at innovating how they recruit and develop the skills of top-notch employees as they do with their machinery. They all know that no business can succeed without talented people from the factory floor to the executive boardroom.

Still, Deere is a good example, and its CEO, Samuel Allen, even devoted a considerable portion of his February 2014 shareholders’ meeting speech to the need to grow the company’s human resources. Here is what he said, in a longer extract than Country Guide would normally print because of the insight it may give farmers into how such a company thinks about the kind of HR issues that are increasingly affecting farmers, both in terms of their hired and family staff: “There’s nothing that will have more impact on John Deere’s future than a supremely talented, committed and motivated workforce, such as our 65,000 employees and leaders. Everywhere we operate, we seek to attract the best talent, then to develop and deploy that talent for the ultimate benefit of our cus-

Abe Hughes, vice-president New Holland, North America.

38 country-guide.ca

February 17, 2015

machinery

Finding talented employees, grooming and retaining them to work in positions all the way from the assembly line to key executive positions are key priorities for ag equipment manufacturers.

Photo: AGCo

tomers and investors. We’ve adopted disciplined processes to accomplish this aim and exacting metrics to stay on track.

“There’s always room for improvement, of course. But we’re making further progress in categories such as hiring preferred candidates, finding challenging developmental assignments, and building employee engagement. Engagement is a particular priority, because it is a key driver of performance, innovation and growth — all essential to carrying out our strategic plans.

“We also stress developing the right kind of leaders, those who share our values and have the drive and determination to help fulfil our mission of serving those linked to the land. That’s why we take leadership development so seriously and do everything possible to assist our people in making the most of their skills and realizing their potential.

“Among other steps, we’ve added rigour to our succession planning processes to ensure we have talented leaders in place throughout the world for our present and future needs.

“A major objective is developing indigenous, or regional, talent to help manage our non-U.S. operations and extend the John Deere brand to a wider global audience. I’m proud to note that, partly as a result of this emphasis, Deere has an increasing number of extremely capable nationals serving in key management roles across Asia, Europe and South America.

“The way we see it, bringing more February 17, 2015

diversity to our workforce, including our leadership ranks, makes our business goals that much more attainable. It fosters a richer global mindset and helps us achieve a deeper understanding of our customers — a group that itself has a wider range of backgrounds and needs than ever before.”

At New Holland Then, when I spoke to Abe Hughes, vice-president of New Holland North America last July, I asked him not only how he finds candidates with the right combination of education and experience to take a position on his executive team, but how he allows them to develop.

Again, this is a longer transcript than we would normally include. But again too, the insights that it reveals into how to make an HR goal actionable are impressive.

“It’s a very complicated question,” Hughes said. “It’s a good question. It’s hard to get people in a rural economy. A lot of people will leave the farm, go get a college education and they won’t come back. We need people that are college educated for this business.

“What we’ve got to help us with that is, No. 1, we’re trying to build our brand early on. We have partnerships with colleges and students. We have a pretty robust internship program we’re running. We want to get engineers and people from ag economics, pull them in and get them accustomed to our business. See them for a couple of years and then give them an offer.

“And then once we’ve got them in,

Samuel Allen, CEO of John Deere. once they’ve been working with you for five or 10 years, how do you keep them?

So I’ve created here a talent development program, where we identify our 12 or 15 stars every year. Then we’re deliberately putting them through a six-month program where we tell them you’re a star, you’re valued here. Then we get them into specific skill development. And then they have to work on a key problem we want to solve. They work on this together as a team, so they develop teamwork skills.

“Then out of those groups there are some keepers. We take those guys and we are deliberately putting them in key assignments to take them to the next level. It’s experiential, you know.

“But you’ve got to find the right people that probably come from a farm background that are doing ag economics or ag engineering and then develop and foster them from there.”

Even though Hughes says he’s looking for candidates with ag backgrounds, he doesn’t restrict his recruitment to the traditional agricultural colleges in the big ag regions, even recently hiring a Harvard graduate who had other job offers from competing industries.

“With that guy we had to compete with Wall Street and the Internet companies, we had to convince him he could have a wonderful career here and be around the things he loves,” Hughes explained. “He wanted to work in this (ag equipment) business. I mean, who wouldn’t? It’s fun being around farm equipment.” CG country-guide.ca 39

CropsGuide

By ralph pearce, cg production editor

electric metering for your planter Among the hottest new innovations for corn, these electric seed meters are catching on. The secret’s out! recision agriculture just keeps getting more and more precise. The industry has seen the advent and refinement of yield monitors and variable-rate application, and now it has moved on to improved singulation in planters, automated down-pressure, and higher planting speeds.

Most of those innovations have come in response to a growing time crunch. The windows for planting, spraying and harvesting are getting smaller and tighter, partly due to climatic challenges in the past few years, but also in response to the trends toward expanded farm acreages and the size and complexity of operations.

Now there’s a newer technology for increasing efficiency for growers and for those with significant contours on their land.

Electric seed meters have been around for about three years. It was 2011 when Graham Equipment first entered the market, and since then, Horsch has made the technology standard on its units while Kinze is adding them to the latest upgrades on its 4900 series planter. Precision Planting is also adding after-market kits (similar to Graham’s). And last August, Case IH announced it would provide growers with the option of having Precision Planting electric meters installed directly at the factory.

For the proponents of electric metering technology, the advantages are numerous and far ranging.

One, the move towards widespread adoption of electronics is already taking shape. Two, in terms that are specific to planting technology, electric meters remove the clutches, chains and shafts of conventional systems. Three, singulation is a much simpler matter, given the meter’s ability to handle any seed size or shape or even speed. And the plant spacing, no matter the curves or contours, is kept constant, which, says Tom Snyder, is a huge benefit.

“Our whole challenge in the industry is to get a meter that will properly singulate and distribute seed across a wide variety of sizes and shapes,” says Snyder, owner of Grand River Planters in Caledonia, Ont. “If we go around contours with the planter with the electric drives, every meter turns at the rate it needs to keep your spacing consistent, whereas with a shaft-type system, that whole shaft turns at the same speed. It doesn’t matter if the planter is going straight or around a contour, so you can end up with over40 country-guide.ca

Within a very few years, electric meters are expected to become standard equipment. population on the inside rows and underpopulation on the outside rows. And it costs you money.”

But that doesn’t happen with electric seed meters.

Now, more farmers are agreeing that if technology can save them from physically getting in and out of the tractor cab, or if it ensures correct spacing, it has to be worth something. With the Precision Planting unit, the electric drive system — the eDrive — is designed to work only with the company’s vSet meter. That, says Snyder, allows for the installation on almost any manufacturer’s planter. As long as the seed tube can be lined up on the meter, everything should work without any problems.

Admittedly, there’s some issue with so-called “sticker shock,” and Snyder concedes there may be some reluctance to invest that money in this technology. But in comparing the two types, Snyder points out that adding end-row shut-off clutches and hydraulic drives for variable-rate technology also adds to the price of conventional seed meters and planter setups. Once those add-ons are taken into consideration, the pricing discrepancy isn’t so wide, he argues. Plus the trend is favouring the move towards electronics in seed meters; in a few years, it’s expected that electric meters will become the standard. february 17, 2015

PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY “When you think about electronics and what we can gain as far as the torque of an electric motor over and above what a diesel does running through an engine, it’s huge,” says Snyder. “It might not come as fast as what some want, but there are definitely advantages to it. We’ve tried them on our own farm and we’ve made a lot of improvements on our own planter. There are a few things I just wouldn’t budge on, and one is that I wouldn’t go back to a shaft and chain-type scenario; electric drives are where it’s at.”

Electric has its place, but…

For Kirk Van Will, electric meters may be the way of the future, but for now he sees a limited uptake in the technology in his immediate area. As a yield specialist for Lambton and West Middlesex counties for Maizex Seed, he admits his experience with electric metering is limited. He does recognize the advantages in relation to time saved in mechanical maintenance and repairs, not to mention the ease of operation, especially as the trend in expanding acreages continues.

“If you look at farming today, there are more of the larger farms, which indicates a grower is becoming more of a manager, or at the very least, someone who’s not quite as hands on,” says Van Will, who’s based in Strathroy, Ont. With electric metering, he says, “the hired employees they have don’t need to worry about all of those clutches that take time to learn. This is more of a snap-it-in system, and away you go.”

The advantages to Van Will are obvious.

Beyond the time savings for learning and repairs of conventional planter technology, there are the contouring capabilities, matching turns with row spacing requirements.

That may not be a huge factor for a region like Lambton, where a lot of fields are squared off. But in regions where a stream meanders through a field, or a tree lot isn’t squared to the property line, this technology is more likely to gain acceptance.

Yet Van Will maintains that the technology’s marketability will be challenged by certain current realities. For instance, those growers who are mechanically inclined and are capable of working with chains, clutches and hydraulics may not be as quick to change. The counter to that may be that growers are beginning to february 17, 2015

understand the value of their time. They may be able to fix things themselves, but in recognizing how and where to better spend their time, they may feel they’re better off with a new planter and electric seed meters.

Another factor that could slow acceptance is in diagnosing any problems. Snyder concedes that loss of the alternator on an electric meter would create significant headaches for a grower, especially in the middle of planting season. But Van Will takes that one step further — to the machine’s downtime.

“Running wires along the frame of a planter and by row can be problematic,” he says. “And when you store it in the winter, there are rodents and other pests that can get in there. Then you have a grounding wire touching a frame or it gets worn and touches a frame, it can really create a lot of havoc.”

In order to avoid those issues, a grower might just choose to rewire the whole system.

Still, there’s a tone of inevitability that Van Will agrees is hard to counter: the trend is already taking shape,

and electronics will become the new standard. Even those growers who have recently purchased a new planter will reach the point in the next five years when the technology has become more widely adopted and prices have come down because of the availability of the technology.

At that point, it’d be a little easier for the grower to make the decision to move to an electric-metered system.

“I would wonder if you won’t see those electric meters start to pop up just because of that,” says Van Will.

It’s not really a matter of electric seed meters increasing final yields. Much like unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or electronic soil analysis, the technology alone does not make a farmer better simply by owning or utilizing it. It only increases efficiency in the hands of a knowledgeable user.

Increased yield still comes down to what’s in the seed, how it’s planted and how it performs in the field. Technology, however, can improve efficiency, and on more farms today, efficiency is getting to be a bigger and bigger deal. CG

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CropsGuide

By ralph pearce, production editor

a cover crop that buzzes Phacelia can fit a variety of cropping systems, and it’s popular with bees

Phacelia is unlike any other plant species on today’s farms, so as a cover, it helps break the cycles of corn, soybeans and even wheat.

here’s a new arrival in cover crops called phacelia that has the compelling advantage of being neither a cereal nor an oilseed. In fact, phacelia is a completely new species in Canada’s agriculture, which may prove to be a very good thing indeed.

Phacelia is a member of the waterleaf (Hydrophyllaceae) family. Unlike oilseed radish, its taproot is not as robust, so it’s not an ideal candidate for breaking through a compacted plow-pan. Instead, it produces a diffuse mass of fine roots near the soil surface that helps bind soil aggregates even after the plant begins to break down with winter.

Friedhelm Hoffmann, the general operating manager at Exeter Produce in Exeter, Ont., is very familiar with phacelia. Before he came to Canada 16 years ago, he grew it as a cover crop in Germany. To his knowledge, phacelia has been used as a cover crop in Europe for at least 40 years. In 2013, he grew a trial plot and in 2014, he planted the first field-scale test of the cover crop in Ontario.

In past, Exeter Produce would plant oats as a cover, but lately they’ve been trying different cropping options, and from Hoffmann’s perspective the important thing is to grow “something” after the vegetable crops. He wants another crop to protect the soil surface and to keep nutrients cycling.

“I know that phacelia is a good cover crop because it takes up a lot of nitrate,” Hoffmann says.

“The questionable part is when it releases it. It takes up a lot more nitrogen than oats, up to 90 lbs. of N per acre, depending on the situation.”

42 country-guide.ca

Secondary benefit To anyone touring Hoffmann’s field-scale trial, another benefit was obvious. Bees love phacelia too.

The controversy over neonicotinoid seed treatments and their potential effect on bee health has agriculture looking for good news relating to bees, and phacelia provides that.

“It flowers at a time when there aren’t a lot of blossoms available,” says Hoffmann. “It’s a very bee-friendly flower, and it flowers for a long time.”

Anne Verhallen likes phacelia for all the same reasons Hoffmann does. “The timing for it would be right because it doesn’t do well in the heat,” says Verhallen, the soil specialist for horticultural crops with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA). “And I don’t know for sure because I haven’t done the research on it but I’m thinking it will need a bit of nitrogen or manure or something to get the most growth out of it.”

That may be another management component to watch for with phacelia. Wheat yields in the past five to 10 years have advanced and there isn’t a lot of residual nitrogen left behind, as was evident from the yellowed radish fields this past fall.

Because of that, growers may need a supplementary nitrogen application to give the phacelia crop a boost.

But another intriguing benefit of phacelia may be as a fall weed control tool. Specialists such as Peter Johnson and Mike Cowbrough of OMAFRA and researchers Dr. Peter Sikkema of University of Guelph see a growing need to adopt a fall weed management program.

Verhallen believes phacelia may help. It may suppress weeds better than a fall burn-down with its late-season canopy, she points out. Planting a cover crop in late summer that provides late-fall weed suppression would also reduce the complaint that fall is already a busy season, and that time for weed management practices is limited.

“It’s just as good if not better than a fall herbicide program,” says Verhallen. “There are fringe benefits from a cover crop: the fall herbicide program kills everything there, and then it stops. But the cover crop keeps giving all season.”

There are potential drawbacks to phacelia, because seed costs are high and availability is limited. Both Hoffmann and Verhallen believe however, that those will be only short-term issues. CG february 17, 2015

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Working 9 to 5: What a way to kill those weeds!� ompetitive broadleaf weeds, specifically lamb’s quarters and velvetleaf, are easier to kill when herbicides are applied during the day, generally between the hours of 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Most will joke that this is simply because civil servants like me do not want to work before 9 a.m. and after 6 p.m. Touché. However, warmer air temperature, less dew, and the orientation of weed leaves to intercept more spray droplets are some of the factors that explain better control when post-emergent herbicides are sprayed during the day (See Figure 1).

there was a grower in the room who was using the product and was pleased with its performance.

The product is called the “Pattern Master” by K-B Agri-Tech (Figure 2), and prices for different booms can be found at the company’s website (shop.kbagritechllc.com). My crude math puts the price per unit at roughly $55. The manufacturer claims that the Pattern Master will “reduce drift and increase coverage” (Figure 3). The American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers gave the Pattern Master its AE50 Outstanding Innovations Award for 2015.

Figure 1. The control of velvetleaf with glyphosate as influenced by the time of day when glyphosate was applied

Figure 2. A close-up of the Pattern Master

100 90

% Control

80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 6:00 A.m

9:00 A.M.

12:00 p.m.

3:00 p.m.

6:00 p.m.

9:00 p.m. 12:00 a.m.

Source: PH. Sikkema, University of Guelph (Ridgetown Campus)

A time-of-day response has been observed by many scientists spanning several decades, so it’s not a fluke.

However, the major objection with daytime spraying is that wind speeds are typically highest during this time, increasing the risk of drift. Although there can be days with high and gusty wind speeds, the risk of spray drift is just as significant during periods of dead calm which often occur in the early morning or late evening. At that time the temperature is usually cooler and the relative humidity is typically higher, which can result in the spray droplets remaining aloft, like fog. When the wind picks up, these spray droplets can move away from the target area, possibly causing injury to adjacent non-target areas. Off-target drift in calm conditions can occur hours after the spray event was completed*.

It is therefore more productive to focus on methods to maximize spray droplet coverage on the target during the day when wind speeds aren’t excessively high and gusty. During the 2015 Southwest Agricultural Conference in Ridgetown in January, I sat in on Jason Deveau’s talk on new sprayer tools and was intrigued by one item, especially since 44 country-guide.ca

If you’ve been struggling to get good consistent weed control with post-emergent herbicides and if inappropriate weed staging, poor environmental conditions and herbicide resistance cannot explain the poor control, it would be worthwhile to focus on improving coverage, reducing drift and spraying during the day. To see other sprayer tools and tricks, visit sprayers101.com or view Jason’s presentation at southwestagconference.ca.

Figure 3. Spray coverage on water-sensitive paper with nozzles at two different water volumes comparing use of the Pattern Master (“brush”) to without (“no brush”) 12.3 MPH 8006 Flat Fan tips

15 gpa

20 gpa

Brush

No Brush * Taken from “Using Pesticides in Ontario” by Denise Beaton and Jason Deveau (Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs).

February 17, 2015

w e at h e r

NEAR-NORMAL TEMPERATURES AND PRECIPITATION

Changeable Occasional snow

S ra ca Mild in tte / s re no d w

MILDER AND DRIER THAN NORMAL

ONTARIO

NEAR NORMAL

Oc Co ca ld sn sio ow na

MILDER THAN NORMAL

ld Co owy Sn

l

COLDER THAN USUAL NEAR- TO BELOW-NORMAL SNOWFA LL

E

N

ES

R U AT N R PE TIO M A TE IT L CIP A M E R PR O -N D R AN A

S at torm Sn tim y ow es / ra in

COOLER THAN NORMAL

February 22 to March 21, 2015 February 22 to March 21, 2015

Feb. 22-28: Seasonal to cold temperatures with a few higher wind chills, but some thawing occurs in the south. Sunny skies alternate with occasional heavier snow, at times mixed with rain in the south.

Mar. 1-7: Pleasant overall with thawing in the south on several days this week, but a disturbance results in snow, mixed with rain in the south on a couple of days. Blustery. Often snowy and cold in the north.

Mar. 8-14: Fair overall with a few milder days and melting in the south. However, periodic snow to rain in the south changing to heavier snow in northern regions on a couple of days. Windy at times.

Mar. 15-21: Temperatures fluctuate and at times reach double digits in the south and above zero north. Sunny skies interchange, with some rain or snow in the south with heavier snow in the north.

Windy.

QUEBEC Feb. 22-28: Seasonable to cold but with minor thawing in the south. Bright and fair on most days apart from a couple of colder, windy days with heavier snowfalls.

Chance of rain in the south. Blustery.

Mar. 1-7: Expect a few pleasant sunny days with some thawing in the south, but also look for a couple of unsettled days with snow or rain in the south changing to heavy snow in the north. Windy at times.

Mar. 8-14: Conditions fluctuate this week February 17, 2015

with a few windy days. Temperatures vary from mild to cold. Sunny days will interchange with some heavier rain/ snow in the south and heavy snow in the north.

Mar. 15-21: Sunny overall with a few pleasant days and thawing in southern regions. Sub-zero lows. On a couple of days expect snow or rain in the south changing to heavy snow in northern regions. Brisk winds.

ATLANTIC PROVINCES Feb. 22-28: Temperatures vary but average near normal. Fair but with a couple of unsettled days this week, with occasional snow, heavier on windward coasts.

Some rain in the south. Windy at times.

Mar. 1-7: Disturbances result in changing weather as fair skies alternate with snow, some rain. Chance of heavy precipitation. Temperatures run through the freeze-thaw range in the south but cold in the north. Blustery.

Mar. 8-14: Temperatures are seasonal but with a few milder days and thawing. Fair days will interchange with snow to rain on the coasts and heavier snow elsewhere. Occasionally windy. Cold, snowy north.

Mar. 15-21: A few unsettled days this week with snow or rain in the south and snow in the north. Chance of heavy precipitation. Windy days create variable temperatures, at times leaning to the mild side south but cold in the north.

NATIONAL HIGHLIGHTS Longer days will combine with milder southerly winds to lessen winter’s grip on Canada in this period. The warming is expected to be most noticeable on the west and east coasts where milder-than-usual temperatures are anticipated. However, storminess is likely in the Maritime provinces from time to time as disturbances moving up the Atlantic seaboard bring unsettled conditions to the east. In the West, some of the milder air in British Columbia is expected to slide onto the western Prairies at times, bringing occasional melting by late February and early in March. Nevertheless, cold Arctic air is likely to continue its grasp across the eastern Prairies, northern Ontario and northern Quebec. Near-tonormal snowfall will accompany the colder air in these central areas of the country.

Editor’s note:

Where’s my weather page?

Look in every second issue for your month-long Country Guide weather forecast during the winter months when we’re publishing every two weeks.

Prepared by meteorologist Larry Romaniuk of Weatherite Services. Forecasts should be 80 per cent accurate for your area; expect variations by a day or two due to changeable speed of weather systems. country-guide.ca 45

hr

Doctor, give me some Ritalin for my husband!

Entrepreneurs are four times more likely to suffer from ADHD

By Pierrette Desrosiers, work psychologist, business coach, and author

n order to be successful, entrepreneurs need many qualities, including an adventurous spirit, creativity, innovation, high energy levels, and resilience. In addition, they generally need stimulation, and they are willing to take risks. All of these traits are more often present in entrepreneurs than in the rest of the population.

However, what if these characteristics also trend towards ADHD? Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common childhood disorders and can continue through adolescence and adulthood.

Symptoms include difficulty staying focused and paying attention, difficulty controlling behaviour, and hyperactivity (overactivity).

Everyone knows a child who uses Ritalin because of ADHD. Among affected children, 60 per cent will continue to have some of the symptoms after they reach adulthood. In fact, four per cent of the adult population are affected to some degree.

But what happens when the ADHD adult is at the head of a company?

“He runs like a dog chasing its tail,” says a spouse who contacted me. “He starts something and never finishes. He is scattered, has difficulty concentrating, and suffers from insomnia. In addition, he consumes more and more. I think it is to calm the nerves.”

Although some features of this condition can contribute to an entrepreneur’s success (creativity, great energy, overflowing passion, resilience in difficulties, risk appetite), the same phenomenon may also contribute to loss or to great difficulties in the entrepreneur’s life.

Looking at the trio of issues often associated with ADHD (impulsivity, irritability and attention), problem behaviours are more frequent and more apparent.

The person has difficulty organizing and planning.

They are scattered in their thoughts; their actions and their environment look like a battlefield. They are always looking for things (because they never put them in the same place), the bills are stacked or lost and thus constantly paid late, they are often late and lack the ability to plan and prioritize. They also tend towards procrastination, yet they also have a propensity to continually introduce new tasks that they never finish.

As you can see, it can be difficult to make sound management decisions and run a business when ADHD is untreated.

46 country-guide.ca

Here is a short list of symptoms with ADHD: • Frequent forgetfulness and delays; • Difficulty concentrating; • Low self-esteem; • Irritability, difficulty controlling anger; • Impulsivity; • Relationship problems (conflicts); • Mood disorders (30 per cent); • Substance abuse (25 to 50 per cent); • Bipolar disorders (eight per cent); • Anxiety disorders (30 per cent); • Behaviour disorders (eight per cent).

Because impulsivity is usually present, the risk of accidents on the farm also increases. As well, because ADHD adults can act without considering the consequences, they often compulsively spend.

In adults, ADHD often goes unnoticed because the person says it is their personality. When left unchecked, however, it threatens the survival of the farm.

In addition, our modern life and the abundance of information (Internet, email, texting, smartphones…) coming at us from all sides tends to amplify ADHD in those who already have a predisposition.

Many great business people have had ADHD (Andrew Carnegie, Malcolm Forbes, Henry Ford). They were able to seize the moment in the marketplace, see things that others couldn’t, follow their instincts, and reject “common sense.”

Yet many entrepreneurs do struggle and need treatment, and in certain cases medication is warranted. Unfortunately, the diagnosis is often made when the person is looking for a solution to another problem, so damage has already been done. If you believe you might be affected, see a doctor or psychologist. It may save your marriage and your business. Entrepreneurs can learn coping strategies: how to slow down, relax, ask for help, and take advice.

They have to learn to get organized, make a plan and stick to it… well, most of the time. By doing this, they can take back their lives and their business. CG Pierrette Desrosiers, MPS, CRHA is a work psychologist, professional speaker, coach and author who specializes in the agricultural industry. She comes from a family of farmers and she and her husband have farmed for more than 25 years (www.pierrettedesrosiers.com). Contact her at pierrette@pierrettedesrosiers.com.

February 17, 2015

h e a lt h

Bloody noses — when should you worry?

By Marie Berry

nosebleed can be both bothersome and alarming, even if you don’t know its technical name is epistaxis. Most people have at least one nosebleed between the ages of three and 30.

Children younger than three usually do not have nosebleeds because they do not often experience nasal damage, and older people may have nosebleeds more often because of medical conditions and/or the medications they take.

The nose is responsible for the intake of air into the lungs, but it is lined with a rich supply of blood vessels that warm and moisturize the air along the way. The septum which separates your nasal passages is especially rich in blood vessels and most nosebleeds result from damage there.

An obvious cause of nosebleeds can be trauma to the nose, such as a blow to the nose, nose “picking,” or a foreign body lodged in the nose. Dry nasal passages because of low humidity during winter months may also contribute to nosebleeds, as can upper

If a nosebleed lasts over 20 minutes, or if you get several, see a doctor respiratory tract infections like the common cold, or inflammation on nasal passages due to conditions like allergies or hay fever. A deviated septum may also be involved.

If you take any drugs that can thin the blood, the risk for bleeding including nosebleeds can rise.

Acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) and other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen and naproxen are common culprits, but anticoagulants like warfarin and clopidogrel also may be implicated. A dosage adjustment may be needed. Indeed, sometimes a nosebleed is the first sign of too high a dosage.

In older people, kidney disease, atherosclerosis (hardening of arteries), and high blood pressure can

contribute to nosebleeds, but often nosebleeds start on their own without any obvious cause.

About 10 minutes of direct pressure on your nose, usually just below the bridge of your nose, will help stop a nosebleed. You will want to remain upright, so sitting down is fine, but not lying down, and remember to keep your nose higher than your heart. Also remember that bending your head slightly forward will prevent your swallowing blood.

A cool compress applied to the bridge of your nose may also help reduce blood flow.

If your nosebleed lasts for more than 20 minutes without any slowing of the flow, or if you have several nosebleeds without any specific cause, you need to get them checked. Some people use a nasal decongestant to shrink blood vessels, but if you are resorting to this measure, you also should have your nosebleeds checked.

When a nosebleed has resulted from trauma, an examination of the nose is usually recommended to rule out internal damage and any potential for infection. You will want to seek medical attention if a foreign object is lodged in your nose (or your child’s nose). Poking at the object or attempting to remove it may push it farther into the nose and increase the risk for inhaling it.

After a nosebleed, don’t pick at your nose or blow it hard because it could bleed again. Bending over, vigorous activity, hot or spicy food, or even smoking could also restart your nosebleed. If cold, dry air is problematic, lubricating your nasal passages, especially your septum and increasing the humidity at home or work will reduce your risk for nosebleeds.

Don’t ignore nosebleeds or take them for granted. Your blood loss could be significant, leading to anemia, or your nosebleeds could be a sign of an underlying cause. A bloody nose can be bothersome, but it could be the sign of something else as well.

Marie Berry is a lawyer/pharmacist interested in health and education.

Although you’ve probably heard about the increasing rates of tuberculosis, you may think you don’t have to be concerned because you aren’t at risk. While it’s true that tuberculosis does spread in close quarters, the incidence is increasing and everyone needs to be aware of the disease and its risk factors. Next issue, we’ll look at why tuberculosis seems to be making a comeback, and who is at greatest risk.

February 17, 2015

country-guide.ca 47

life

Living with dementia on the farm Alzheimer’s is a frightening diagnosis, but these strategies can maximize your control

By Helen Lammers-Helps etting a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s can be devastating, especially for farmers who want to stay active on the farm.

Even if you’re afraid of bad news, however, it’s important to seek a medical diagnosis as quickly as possible.

Memory loss or problems with cognitive function may be caused by treatable conditions, explains Lisa Loiselle, the associate director of research at the University of Waterloo’s Murray Alzheimer’s Research and Education Program (MAREP). Such conditions can include vitamin deficiencies, stress, depression, anxiety or alcohol abuse.

The sooner you get checked out by your doctor after you start experiencing symptoms, the sooner you can get the right care.

There are also medications that can slow the progression of dementia but, again, these need to be started early, says Dr. Debra Morgan, professor at the Saskatoon-based Canadian Centre for Health and Safety in Agriculture.

Early diagnosis also makes it possible to make plans for the future while the person affected by dementia can still participate in the decision-making process. Some of the arrangements to be considered include transfer of farm management and assets, updating wills and powers of attorney for property and health care, and planning for medical care and living accommodations.

Horse farmer Bill Heibein was working as an accountant in the Thunder Bay area when he was first diagnosed 15 years ago with early onset Alzheimer’s disease at the age of 59. He took early retirement from his accounting job right away but has remained active on the farm since his diagnosis. Now 74, he still keeps horses on the farm and only stopped training and showing his quarter horses a few years ago.

“Getting a diagnosis can feel like a kick in the teeth,” says Heibein, “but putting off seeing a doctor is one of the worst things you can do.” Getting educated can help you and your caregivers cope, he says.

He recommends contacting the Alzheimer’s Society, which has a wealth of useful information.

Heibein says that reducing his stress level by retiring from his accounting job was a good move. He also thinks that remaining active on the farm where he per48 country-guide.ca

forms repetitive tasks has also been good for him. Heibein heats with wood and gets lots of exercise cutting firewood. For many years he has played in a Dixieland band which performs at area senior’s centres. “Playing a musical instrument is good for the brain,” he says.

Heibein has developed systems that help him cope with his short-term memory loss. He uses a large calendar and prompts on his Blackberry smartphone to keep him on track. He also uses a GPS navigation system in his truck to keep him from getting lost when driving. Heibein is also active on various Alzheimer’s Society committees and is involved in a research program at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay. “It’s important to stay involved,” says Heibein, who was upfront with friends and family about his diagnosis.

“I’ve been fortunate that people have treated me the same,” says Heibein, who acknowledges that stigma can be a big problem for those suffering from dementia.

Heilbein also points to the support of his wife of 52 years, Heather, and he says a local support group keeps him up to date on research developments and helps him to not feel alone.

Like Heibein, Loiselle says it’s important to reduce your stress level if you’re suffering from dementia. “Slow down, take your time,” she says.

“Frustration makes confusion worse and increases the risk of an accident happening.”

Older farmers are already at a much higher risk of having an accident on the farm. One study shows farmers aged 70 to 79 are four times more likely to be killed in an accident on the farm than 30- to 39-year-olds, and it stands to reason that dementia would only make that worse, says Morgan.

While continuing to work on the farm can help those afflicted with cognitive problems to feel useful and valued, families need to be aware of the person’s limitations. Unfortunately, there aren’t any guidelines to help family members make those judgment calls, says Morgan. What is safe changes day by day, she continues. “Dementia is progressive and it’s hard to predict how the disease will unfold.”

Loiselle has other advice for people diagnosed with dementia. It’s important both for those experiencing dementia and for their caregivers to let others know what they need. “Communication is absolutely essential,” she says. Other strategies help too: try to stay February 17, 2015

life

“ Getting a diagnosis can be like a kick in the teeth,” says Bill Heibein, “but putting off seeing a doctor is one of the worst things you can do.” positive, keep doing the things that interest you, rest when needed, stick to a routine, and don’t be ashamed.

Family and friends should learn about the disease so they will be more accepting and sensitive to the needs of the person with dementia, continues Loiselle. Too often those with dementia and their caregivers become isolated, she explains. Family and friends can also offer respite care. The primary caregiver may need a break from time to time.

Loiselle also urges family members to include the person with dementia in the decision-making process. “It’s dehumanizing to exclude them,” she says.

Finally, make sure you give yourself enough time to process the diagnosis before making any decisions.

Heibein agrees. He’s glad he made the decision to rebreed their mares, figuring they would be worth more in foal. “It was a good decision,” he says since he was then able to continue training and showing horses for several more years.

Unfortunately, it can be tough to get access to specialists in rural areas. After a successful five-year pilot project, Saskatchewan’s Rural and Remote Memory Clinic in Saskatoon has become a onestop interdisciplinary clinic for those suffering from dementia. The clinic is particularly good at diagnosing the less common and more complex forms of dementia, says Morgan, the clinic’s director.

About 65 per cent of dementia cases are the result of Alzheimer’s disease, but altogether there are 100 different causes of dementia, says Loiselle. Since there is no one test for dementia, patients see all of the necessary doctors and have the necessary tests in one day at the Saskatoon Clinic. By the end of the February 17, 2015

day, patients have a diagnosis instead of spending months travelling to various doctors and hospitals for tests, says Morgan. Patients also receive ongoing followup support through both video conferencing and in-person appointments at the clinic.

As Canada’s population ages, and the average age of farmers continues to climb, the number of farmers with dementia will increase. Today, threequarters of a million Canadians are living with dementia but in 15 years, that number is expected to double to 1.4 million. CG

Resources • Alzheimer’s Society of Canada (also has many local chapters across the country) www.alzheimer.ca • Murray Alzheimer’s Research and Education Program (MAREP), University of Waterloo uwaterloo.ca/murray-alzheimer-research-and-education-program/MAREP www.livingwithdementia.uwaterloo.ca • Kate Swaffer is a person living with Early Onset Alzheimer's Disease. She is committed to meaningful dialogue with a wide range of stakeholders about the critical issues impacting a person living with a diagnosis of dementia and their loved ones. Check out her blog here: www.kateswaffer.com • In Saskatchewan, the Rural Dementia Care Centre cchsa-ccssma.usask.ca/ruraldementiacare/

country-guide.ca 49

acres

By Leeann Minogue

It’s a rink out there When Dale takes grandson Connor to the arena, all sorts of things begin to slip ale Hanson and his son Jeff were out in the shop, trying to fix the electric tarp on their semi trailer. They’d hoped it was just a bad switch, but by mid-morning they’d figured out that the electric motor was seized. They were going to have to go to Regina for a new one before they could finish the job.

“Just as well. It’s too cold to work out here today anyway,” Dale said. “I’ll just change my clothes and get my truck out of the shed. I’ll pick you up in front of your house.”

“I can’t go, Dad,” Jeff said. “Connor has hockey practice this afternoon and Elaine asked me to take him.”

“I thought she said she’d be home all week,” Dale said.

“She’s here, but there’s some online web presentation she wants to watch on her computer after lunch.

It’s about strategy, or planning or something like that.”

“Huh. I would’ve made fun of you for that, but she’s learned a thing or two about negotiation, watching those damn webinars.” Dale had been impressed when Elaine had managed to get an extra set of concaves thrown in when the Hansons finalized the deal to buy a second combine earlier in the winter. “Who would’ve thought it would be smart to take a woman along?” he’d said on the trip home.

But then he’d added, “I just hope the neighbours don’t find out.”

“Wish I could go to Regina with you,” Jeff said.

“I wouldn’t mind picking up some shelves at Home Depot.” Jeff and Elaine had only been in their house a little over a year, and he was still spending most of his winter evenings finishing the basement.

“You go ahead,” Dale said. “I can take Connor to hockey.”

“That’s OK Dad,” Jeff said. “Remember? Mom went out cross-country skiing with some friends. She probably won’t be home before Connor’s practice at four.”

50 country-guide.ca

“Are you kidding? Do you think I can’t take my grandson to the rink unless your mother comes along to hold my hand?”

“Well…” Jeff said.

“Cut me some slack,” Dale said. “I can tie skates onto a five-year-old!”

“They need a lot of equipment. And he’s pretty young. He needs a lot of help.”

Dale just snorted. “Your generation thinks you invented everything. I was putting shoulder pads on you before the Internet existed. Connor and I’ll get along fine. Go to the Home Depot.”

So Jeff went to Regina on a parts run, and a little after three o’clock, Dale picked up his grandson for the trip to town for hockey practice.

“Let’s go Connor,” he said.

“Good luck,” Elaine said, handing Dale a hockey bag almost twice as big as the boy.

They got to the rink and found the right dressing room. Dale was a little concerned when he first unzipped the bag, but as he pulled each piece of gear out, he soon remembered where everything was supposed to go.

“Your dad thought I wouldn’t know how to do this!” he said to Connor. “But it’s like riding a bike.

You never forget.”

“I think that’s the elbow pad for the right arm, Dale,” said Karen Avery, as she helped her daughter into shoulder pads.

Damn, Dale thought. Then he whispered into Connor’s ear, “Do you know when I was growing up, they didn’t let girls play hockey?”

“Neat,” Connor said.

Dale took the elbow pad off Connor’s left arm and started again.

When Connor was ready to hit the ice, Dale left him in the dressing room with the rest of his team and the coach, then went to the rink lobby. He took a look around for the first time in many years, wonfebruary 17, 2015

dering why he and Donna never took the time to go to hockey games. Then he headed over to the concession to get himself a coffee. Rich Walker joined him in the short lineup.

“Hear you got yourself a new combine,” Rich said.

“News travels fast around here,” Dale said.

“The story is that your daughter-in-law talked Greg into throwing in a set of concaves.”

Dale snorted, then pretended not to hear this. Rich saw he’d hit a sore spot and changed the subject.

“With these new low prices, maybe the oilpatch will slow down a bit around here. You might even be able to hire somebody to run that new machine,” Rich said.

“Could be,” Dale said. “There’s already a lot less oil traffic on the road by our place. A few guys who know how to run machinery could end up out of work.”

“Things can change quick in the oil business,” Rich said.

Rich bought Dale’s coffee, and the two men were still standing not too far from the counter when Ron Friesen came to get a cup of his own.

“Heard you got a new combine to use on that land you’re renting from me,” Ron said.

“That’s right,” Dale said.

“Maybe I should’ve waited. If the oilpatch caves in, maybe I could’ve hired somebody and kept farming myself.”

There was a silence. Dale took another sip of coffee, and was relieved when Ron said, “I’m just kidding. I’m done. I could grow the wheat, but I couldn’t get anybody to agree to let me sell it to them.”

And then the men were off on a 20-minute retelling of local elevator company horror stories, each man sharing a worse story than the next about “terrible grading,” or a company not taking contracted grain on time. Soon two more farmers joined in, and Dale remembered how much he’d always loved bringing Jeff to the rink.

Before Connor’s game was finished, Dale had eaten a hotdog, bought a handful of 50-50 tickets, joked with Karen Avery about how tough it was to figure out all the new kids’ equipment and got a line on someone who might be looking for work when seeding time rolled around.

“That was a lot more fun than I thought it would be,” Dale thought to himself when he was back in his truck and on his way home. He was on the edge of town and happened to be driving by a police car when his cellphone rang, so he didn’t even think about answering. Then the phone beeped. “Must be a text. I should figure out how to get this damn thing working through the truck speakers,” he thought.

When he got home, he parked his truck inside the heated shed, then walked to the house. Donna wasn’t home from skiing yet, so he took a look in the fridge to see if there was anything he might want to cook for supper before he thought to check his phone.

It was Elaine who had called. And she’d sent a text, too. It said: “Never mind. Karen Avery took Connor home with her. I’ll pick him up later.”

As he was looking at his screen, cursing himself, his phone beeped and another text appeared. This one was from Jeff.

“Next time, you can go to Regina, Dad. Maybe you’d have more luck with a trip to Home Depot.”

Leeann Minogue is the editor of Grainews, a playwright and part of a family grain farm in southeastern Saskatchewan. february 17, 2015

“ There was a very cautious man Who never laughed or cried, He never cared, he never dared, He never dreamed or tried.

And when one day he passed away, His insurance was denied.

For since he never really lived, They claimed he never died.”

— Author Unknown I arrive at the conference feeling a bit grumpy. Traffic was tied up at rush hour. The leader gives directions while I am hanging my coat. “Take 20 minutes and list your three most life-changing experiences.” After catching my breath I begin to write: train ride to college in a strange city, first solo in an airplane, falling in love and more. The leader summarized the responses. Something was common to all the lists. Every life-changing event meant taking risks, stepping beyond usual boundaries, trying something new.

I reflected that we are exposed to risks every day. An oncoming driver may swerve and hit you. The food in a restaurant may contain a deadly virus. A man with a rifle may shoot at you in a mall.

You may go to church and your heart will stop before the service is over. We are not God. We do not know about tomorrow.

In her book God, But I’m Bored, Eileen Guder writes, “You can live on bland food so as to avoid an ulcer; drink no tea or coffee or other stimulants, in the name of health; go to bed early and stay away from nightlife; avoid all controversial subjects so as never to give offense; mind your own business and avoid involvement in other people’s problems; spend money only on necessities and save all you can. You can still break your neck in the bathtub, and it will serve you right.”

You cannot avoid risk even if you want to. Our plans for tomorrow’s activities can be shattered by a thousand unknowns whether we stay at home under the covers or back out of our garage.

The biblical writer James gives practical advice: “Now listen to me, you that say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go into business and make a lot of money.” You don’t even know what your life tomorrow will be! You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment and then disappears. What you should say is this: “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.”

Sherlock Holmes and Watson were camping. In the middle of the night Sherlock Holmes awoke and looked up at the stars. He asked, “Watson, what do you see?” Woken from his sleep Watson looked up and said “stars.” “Yes, but what do these stars tell you?” Watson said “Cosmologically they tell me that we are part of a large universe — that we are one of billions and billions of planets. Theologically they tell me that we have a great God who made all of it. Meteorologically they tell me that the sky is clear and we will have good weather tomorrow. Temporally they tell me that it is the middle of the night and we should be sleeping!

Sherlock, what do they tell you?” “Well,” he replied, “they tell me that someone has stolen our tent.”

The Swiss philosopher and poet Henri Frédéric Amiel wrote this blessing: “Life is short and we do not have much time to gladden the hearts of those who travel this journey with us, so be swift to love and make haste to be kind.”

Suggested Scripture: Psalm 147, James 4:13-15 Rod Andrews is a retired Anglican bishop. He lives in Saskatoon. country-guide.ca 51

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