Canadian agriculture producers and agribusiness operators considering renewable energy sources in their business will soon have a new financing option.

"There are sources of energy all around Canadian farmyards and we're helping producers invest in the technologies needed to tap those opportunities," says Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz.

The Farm Credit Canada Energy Loan will help producers and agribusiness owners who want to produce their own renewable energy. Greg Stewart, FCC President and Chief Executive Officer says it's a growing interest of Canadian producers.

"We're definitely seeing an increase in the number of people across the country who are interested in renewable energy sources to reduce costs and demand on the energy grid," he says.

A recent FCC Vision study showed 60 per cent of individuals surveyed are considering new ways to find financial value by reducing their environmental impact.

The survey, completed in November 2009 by 1,172 producers and agribusinesses across the country, revealed 37 per cent of those looking to reduce their impact are considering the use of renewable energy sources in their operation.

Available March 1, the energy loan will help producers and agribusiness operators purchase and install on-farm energy sources like biogas, geo-thermal, wind or solar power. The energy loan offers an interest term of up to five years at variable or fixed rates and with monthly, quarterly, semi-annual and annual payments available.

For more information on the Vision survey, visit http://www.fccvision.ca/InAction.aspx.

This year’s Manitoba weather pattern isn’t going to be much different than last year, according to Drew Lerner, a senior agriculture meteorologist.

Lerner, president of United States-based World Weather, Inc., told delegates at the annual GrainWorld conference in Winnipeg last week that a convergence of natural phenomena will result in another wet spring in Manitoba's Red River Valley and cool growing season across the Prairies in 2010.

According to Lerner, a jet stream will dip south as part of its 18-year cycle and cause as much as a two- to three-week delay in seeding in the North American plains. In addition, the Pacific warming system El Niño is weakening rapidly and is expected to disappear by June, earlier than previously anticipated.

Lerner also predicts an increased number of sunspots. He says records dating back to the 1700s indicate sunspots represent a cooling cycle on the sun -- and subsequently on the earth.

These factors add up to Canadian agriculture producers facing another challenging year, Lerner says.

Lerner says there's no guarantee of a repeat of last year's unusually warm November weather -- which producers used to reel in a late harvest. November's warm weather was a stroke of luck, he says.

Lerner’s outlook indicates southern Manitoba and eastern Saskatchewan will be cooler than usual with normal precipitation throughout the summer, but the dry region stretching from Edmonton to the Peace River area won’t see a return to normal precipitation until late summer.

He also suggests that the southern portion of Alberta and western corner of Saskatchewan will receive normal precipitation during the growing season.

Lerner says a combination of high moisture content in the soil, snowfall accumulations of more than six inches in North Dakota and saturated soils in adjacent states will set the stage for widespread flooding in the Red River Valley this year. He notes the extent of flooding depends on spring thaw and the amount of precipitation the area receives in the next few weeks.

Local Red River flood forecasts support Lerner’s outlooks. Manitoba Water Stewardship's preliminary flood forecast (issued Feb. 22) indicates that with favourable weather -- a slow melt with minor precipitation -- flooding will be minor to moderate. Average melt rates and precipitation will produce extensive flooding and a fast thaw accompanied by above average rainfall will produce severe flooding close to 1997 levels.

Soft fruits like berries, cherries and grapes are under a new threat with discovery of a devastating pest from Asia on several British Columbia farms last fall.

Spotted wing drosophila, a vinegar fly, can destroy an entire crop in a season, despite its tiny size.

Members of the Okanagan Kootenay Cherry Growers’ Association have agreed to fund a monitoring program to include trapping, identification and fruit inspection to map the progress of this new pest, which was discovered in an Abbotsford berry field and an East Kelowna cherry orchard late last season.

Entomologists from the agriculture ministry and the Pacific Agri-food Research Centre in Summerland are working with counterparts in California, Oregon and Washington, where the pest was also discovered last year, to put together an emergency management strategy for the small fly.

Susanna Acheampong, entomologist with the agriculture ministry’s Kelowna office, says it’s expected overwintering flies may turn up by May -- if there are any -- so monitoring must begin before then.

On farms in Oregon's Williamette Valley, where the fly was found in peaches, some growers lost up to 80 per cent of their crop. In Northern California, about a third of the cherry crop was lost to the pest last year.

The fly is native to Asia, but can be transported in ripe fruit like berries, cherries or grapes. The male fly can be identified by a dark smudge on each wing. Adults lay eggs under the skin of the fruit, so the larvae have an ample food supply once hatched.

The females can lay 16 eggs a day and average 384 eggs. The eggs hatch in two to 72 hours and the larvae mature in three to 15 days.

While other fruit flies infest overripe or rotting fruit, the spotted wing drosophila infests fruit just before harvest, which could have a devastating economic effect.

Adults can be blown by the wind to infest new fruit on neighbouring farms or they can be transported to new regions by infested fruit.

Entomologist Howard Thistlewood says there’s no way of knowing when the flies, either as overwintering adults or pests on supermarket fruit, will arrive in the Okanagan Valley.

However, Hank Markgraf, Okanagan Tree Fruit Co-operative field services manager says there’s the potential of five or six generations a season here, “so they can get wildly out of control in one season.”

Kelowna grower David H. Geen says it’s important producers groups and the provincial agriculture department come up with an effective plan to tackle the issue.

Nova Scotia's troubled pork industry has suffered another blow.

Larsens in Berwick is shutting down its fresh-pork processing operation at the end of March because of a shortage of live hogs.

The decision will affect 45 people who work at the plant and also mean one fewer market for remaining hog producers.

Larsens says it will try to minimize layoffs by offering a voluntary incentive package to a limited number of senior employees.

The company says this will have no impact on its processed meats operation, which employs over 300 people.

The Canadian Young Farmers’ Forum is receiving a boost in funding over the next four years to help educate and develop young and beginning agriculture producers across the country.

The federal government committed about $25,000 a year to existing annual levels of approximately $275,000 for a total of $1.2 million over four years, according to CYFF general manager Rod Scarlett.

The extra funds will help the forum target its two top priorities -- promotion and stabilization of provincial organizations and a series of best management practice workshops in every province, says Scarlett. 

The investment will also help deliver information for young producers through the forum’s newsletter and web site and facilitate meetings for young Canadian producers to exchange ideas and develop solutions for establishing viable businesses.

Scarlett says many young producers want a federal plan to improve the image of agriculture and attract more young people.

The head of North America’s only francophone agriculture university program says changing demographics is one of many factors making agriculture a tough sell to potential university students.

“We’re faced with some serious recruitment challenges,” says Jean-Paul Laforest, dean of the faculty of agriculture and food sciences at Université Laval in Quebec City. “It’s a big concern.”

According to Laforest, there are 970 undergraduate students in his faculty, roughly 500 of them in agriculture. That's half the number enrolled 20 years ago -- and there are no signs the numbers will bounce back.

Laforest blames much of that decline on a double demographic whammy: bigger cities and fewer kids.

“Most of our students used to come from rural areas,” he says. “But those populations continue to decline. All the growth is in urban areas, particularly Montreal.”

Complicating matters, he adds, is the fact that agriculture has little visibility in the provincial metropolis.

Laval has teamed up with McGill University, which offers agriculture and environmental degree programs in English. They've pooled their marketing dollars in an effort to raise their public profiles on college campuses, particularly in the Montreal area. In addition to a recruiter, the faculties are planning an ad campaigns that target students on the island of Montreal.

“Montreal is the focus,” Laforest says. “We want to be more aggressive (and) try some different things.”

The big limitation, he adds, is his faculty’s marketing budget of $50,000.

That’s why he is hoping to get help from the many stakeholders in the agriculture and food sectors, including the province’s main farming union, the Union des producteurs agricoles, and commercial heavyweights like Agropur, a provincial co-operative dairy.

“We all have a vested interest in this issue,” Laforest says. “Agriculture is such a fascinating field (and) job placement is almost 100 per cent. We have to try and get that message out to young people.”

Canadian pork producers now have more time to apply for government-backed long-term loans.

The deadline to apply for a loan under the Hog Industry Loan Loss Reserve Program has been extended from March 1 to March 26.

The Canadian Pork Council and the federal government have worked to develop the program to assist the pork industry in dealing with immediate short-term cash-flow pressures. The program is designed to increase access to credit for eligible producers currently producing hogs in Canada.

Eligible producers must provide a business plan which demonstrates that the business is or can be viable and has a reasonable prospect of repaying the loan.

The federal government will share the risk for producers who choose this option. The program is not meant to add more debt to a business, but to help producers spread their short-term debt payments over a longer period of time, thereby freeing up cash in the near term.

In addition to the deadline extension for applications under the Hog Industry Loan Loss Reserve Program, the government is also increasing its share of the risk to 90 per cent on loans used to repay advances received under the Advance Payments Program. This change will translate in an increase of the reserve allocated to each financial institution to cover potential loan losses.

The federal government and the Canadian Pork Council also partnered to deliver $75 million through the Hog Farm Transition Program to help producers who decide to exit the industry. The program allows producers to tender bids for the amount of funding they need to transition out of the hog industry and cease hog production for at least three years.

In addition to these programs, the government is investing $17 million in the International Pork Marketing Fund to fund market research, promotion and activities that enhance international marketing of Canadian pork products.

For more information on these programs, visit: www.agr.gc.ca/HILLRP or call 1-877-842-5601.

A Saskatchewan pilot program to control coyotes preying on livestock appears to be working.

The Saskatchewan Coyote Control Program was introduced last fall and the latest figures released by the province show about 18,000 coyotes have been killed.

Agriculture Minister Bob Bjornerud says coyotes are increasingly bold, often coming into farmyards in daylight while farm families are outside working.

"This made it necessary to implement a program to help protect the livelihood of our livestock producers and keep their families safe," he says.

A decrease in hunting and trapping due to low prices for coyote pelts compounded the issue, he says.

According to Saskatchewan Environment, an average of 21,000 coyotes are hunted or trapped for their fur each year, with up to 35,000 in some years. The number decreased to 17,700 pelts in 2008-09.

There are 241 rural municipalities participating in the pilot program, representing about 80 per cent of RMs in the province.

The deadline to submit applications to the Saskatchewan Coyote Control Program is March 31, which is when the pilot program will end.

More information, including forms for participants, is available at www.agriculture.gov.sk.ca or by phone at 1-877-874-5365.

Tomato grower Marie Gosselin sees red when she hears statements questioning the environmental wisdom of buying locally-grown produce.

Montreal's Economic Institute made the comments last week.

“It’s so frustrating,” says Gosselin, vice-president of Quebec’s greenhouse growers’ group and a co-owner of Les Serres du St. Laurent. She produces 11 million tonnes of tomatoes a year in six high-tech greenhouses. “It takes away from the huge strides our industry has made to reduce -- even eliminate -- our carbon footprint.”

Researchers with the non-profit think tank concluded that “food miles” -- the distance food travels between the places where it is grown and sold -- were “a poor indictor of a product's impact on the environment and thus not a valid way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.”

They also pointed to an American study that found production to be responsible for 83 per cent of food-related greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation accounted for only 11 per cent.

"If we want to calculate the environmental impact of a strawberry, we have to look at its entire life cycle, from when it is grown to when it reaches our plate," wrote Pierre Desrochers, the co-author of the report, who is also an associate professor of geography at the University of Toronto.

He notes that one hectare of land in California can produce 50,000 kilograms of strawberries compared to 7-10,000 kilograms per hectare in Ontario.

“We have to recognize that some locations are more favourable for producing certain crops," Desrochers says.

He adds there are “perfectly legitimate reasons” for consumers to buy locally grown food.

“If, for example, they find products from local farms to be superior in quality or freshness,” Desrochers says.  "(However) the supposed environmental benefits of buying locally just aren't there."

The report was widely criticized by environmentalists and agriculture producers across Quebec.

Both groups say imported produce often lacks consumer information about the growing conditions and food safety measures, as well as the method of transportation and distances. They also question the nutritional value of thick-skinned, bland-tasting varieties of fruits and vegetables that are grown with long-distance transportation in mind.

“You simply can’t compare the taste and texture and goodness of the fresh tomatoes we’re growing here in our greenhouses to imported ones,” Gosselin says.

She says her company has taken several steps to become more environmentally friendly -- like using biogas captured from a municipal dump for heating their biggest greenhouse, minimal use of pesticides and fertilizers and recuperated pesticides and fertilizers through their hydroponic operations. These steps have made the operation almost carbon neutral.

“You have to take the big picture into consideration (and) use common sense,” she says. “Consumers always win when they buy vegetables that are grown next door.”

The world’s first purpose-built, genetically engineered farm animal, the University of Guelph’s trademarked Enviropig, has cleared a major regulatory hurdle.

Last Saturday, The Canada Gazette, the federal government’s official publication for declaring laws, announced the Enviropig had satisfied Canadian Environmental Protection Act requirements. That means it can be produced using approved livestock containment procedures.

The Enviropig still hasn’t been approved for food use. Its acceptability as human food and animal feed (through rendering) is under review in Canada and the United States by other government agencies, with no firm timetable set. Nonetheless, passing the environmental standards test was a big boost for the Enviropig’s commercialization potential, which is actively being pursued now by the university.

Enviropigs contain genetic material that lets them secrete phytase in their salivary glands. Phytase breaks down normally indigestible phosphorous, which would otherwise be excreted and possibly leach into groundwater.

Research shows phosphorus levels in Enviropig manure are up to 70 per cent lower than regular pigs. It also showed the genetic manipulation does not affect the Enviropig’s physical or nutritional properties.

Guelph has been producing Enviropigs since 1999. Being the first transgenic livestock meant there were no models for comparison. As a result, it’s broken a lot of regulatory ground as it progressed through the close scrutiny of scientists and regulatory officials.

The university’s Steven Liss, associate vice-president (research services), says the intent was always to have Enviropigs introduced commercially, once they met regulatory standards. The university is convinced the Enviropig has role in pollution control, particularly in countries challenged with manure disposal, like China and the United States, which combined produce more than 800 million pigs per year.