Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Promoting Agriculture
Yesterday, the Ontario Farm Animal Council released its 2011 Faces of Farming calendar.
The high-end, glossy, black and white calendar features 12 Ontario farmers and includes a blurb about their lives, their farms and their contributions to the their communities.
2011 Faces of Farming
Kudos to OFAC and the sponsoring groups who put the calendar together. It's a fabulous promotion of agriculture and the tasteful but sexy photographs help show that agriculture can be a great career choice.
Now, why aren't all provinces doing something like this?
The high-end, glossy, black and white calendar features 12 Ontario farmers and includes a blurb about their lives, their farms and their contributions to the their communities.
2011 Faces of Farming
Kudos to OFAC and the sponsoring groups who put the calendar together. It's a fabulous promotion of agriculture and the tasteful but sexy photographs help show that agriculture can be a great career choice.
Now, why aren't all provinces doing something like this?
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Celebrating Canadian Farm Families
I'm writing a book, Celebrating Canadian Farm Families (working title), and I need your assistance.
This book will profile farms of all sizes, from all sectors, from all parts of Canada and I'm looking for farmers to write about.
Who am I looking for?
Male or female, it doesn't matter. Size of the farm doesn't matter either -- I want to profile corporate family farms that are thousands of acres in size and the family farms that are the size of a postage stamp. As long as someone is earning an income from the farming they do, I'm interested. Organic or non-organic (and everything in between) -- that doesn't matter either.
Since the book is a celebration of family operated farms, that's a key element to who I'm looking for. But just like families come in all shapes and sizes these days, so do the farms. Maybe you know of a multi-generational farm, siblings working together or spouses. In all of these cases, I want to interview several members of the family farm operation, so an openness to sitting around the kitchen table or taking me out to show me around the farm is important.
Also key is passion and enthusiasm for agriculture -- loving what they do and loving the life they're living. I recognize there are problems facing Canadian farmers and I'm open to talking about those matters with the families, but I will focus on those who approach issues as problem-solvers, rather than problem-moaners, with the overall celebration of family farming as the main theme.
If someone comes to mind , I would appreciate it if you could forward their contact information to me and maybe tell me a bit about them. If you've written about them, just send me a link to the story, or direct me to the family farm website.
Alternatively, you can send my contact information to them and ask them to contact me. I will be travelling this fall and winter and visit many of the farmers to profile in this book.
A million thank yous for your help with this -- and please contact me at allison@finnamore.ca if you have questions or comments. Also, please feel free to circulate this.
Allison
This book will profile farms of all sizes, from all sectors, from all parts of Canada and I'm looking for farmers to write about.
Who am I looking for?
Male or female, it doesn't matter. Size of the farm doesn't matter either -- I want to profile corporate family farms that are thousands of acres in size and the family farms that are the size of a postage stamp. As long as someone is earning an income from the farming they do, I'm interested. Organic or non-organic (and everything in between) -- that doesn't matter either.
Since the book is a celebration of family operated farms, that's a key element to who I'm looking for. But just like families come in all shapes and sizes these days, so do the farms. Maybe you know of a multi-generational farm, siblings working together or spouses. In all of these cases, I want to interview several members of the family farm operation, so an openness to sitting around the kitchen table or taking me out to show me around the farm is important.
Also key is passion and enthusiasm for agriculture -- loving what they do and loving the life they're living. I recognize there are problems facing Canadian farmers and I'm open to talking about those matters with the families, but I will focus on those who approach issues as problem-solvers, rather than problem-moaners, with the overall celebration of family farming as the main theme.
If someone comes to mind , I would appreciate it if you could forward their contact information to me and maybe tell me a bit about them. If you've written about them, just send me a link to the story, or direct me to the family farm website.
Alternatively, you can send my contact information to them and ask them to contact me. I will be travelling this fall and winter and visit many of the farmers to profile in this book.
A million thank yous for your help with this -- and please contact me at allison@finnamore.ca if you have questions or comments. Also, please feel free to circulate this.
Allison
Monday, October 18, 2010
Strong voice lost
In the 20 years that I've been a reporter, I've met probably thousands of people. Most of them have been kind, some have been rude. Luckily most have been helpful and eager to tell their story.
Sometimes I've been lucky to meet someone who has a passion burning deep in their soul -- someone who loves what they do and has such a story they have to tell, that it's all they can talk about.
Patton MacDonald was like that.
Patton passed away on Thanksgiving weekend. He was the former executive director of the New Brunswick Potato Agency (which changed its name to Potatoes New Brunswick) and former manager of the Nova Scotia Cattle Commission.
I knew him best when he was at the potato agency and I was working for the local daily newspaper. My beat was the entire region -- whatever the news was happening -- and since my base was in the heart of the province's potato belt, agriculture topics became regular stories for me.
I think I had about four phone numbers for Patton -- two cell phones, an office number and a direct line. I knew that if I couldn't reach him, he would call me back as soon as he could. I also knew that if I didn't reach him when I needed to, I could keep calling him until I did reach him.
And he knew that he could always call me with story ideas, comments or concerns. He also knew that he could chat and rant and give me the background of an issue without the rant (necessarily) going into print.
We shared a mutual respect.
Here's how the conversations usually went: I would call him to find out about an issue. I would keep calling every hour until I reached him, or he would call me at about 10 p.m. I would ask him a question then listen to him talk for about 45 minutes about matters sort of related to the question, but not really. He was usually on his way someplace and in a hurry. Near the end of the conversation, I would nail down a comment from him about whatever it was that I called to talk about.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say he helped do more for the province's potato industry -- and for that matter -- New Brunswick agriculture -- during his time at the agency than has been done in the last 20 years.
Patton was on top of Canada-United States potato trade issues, negotiating with trade officials for reduced barriers. He promoted farm safety and helped implement a farm equipment signage program. And when New Brunswick potato farmers were faced with labour shortages and were struggling to get their crops in from the fields, he helped set up a labour hotline, which expanded to a rural labour hotline -- helping put farmers and woodlot owners get in touch with willing workers. He was instrumental in starting the New Brunswick Potato Conference, an annual two-day professional development meeting held every February during a snow storm (I never did figure out how he managed that!).
Nothing Patton did was done alone. Whatever project he tackled he had teams working with him and everyone should share the applause. But Patton was a driving force on getting the word out there about agriculture. He didn't create the news, but he championed the work of New Brunswick farmers. Now, it seems, reporters have to go looking for agriculture news.
It's sad when a strong voice is silenced. Even though Patton hadn't been speaking out loudly about New Brunswick agriculture for some time, I hope another champion can be found. Patton can never be replaced, but the work he did helping promote the province's agriculture industry shouldn't be lost.
Sometimes I've been lucky to meet someone who has a passion burning deep in their soul -- someone who loves what they do and has such a story they have to tell, that it's all they can talk about.
Patton MacDonald was like that.
Patton passed away on Thanksgiving weekend. He was the former executive director of the New Brunswick Potato Agency (which changed its name to Potatoes New Brunswick) and former manager of the Nova Scotia Cattle Commission.
I knew him best when he was at the potato agency and I was working for the local daily newspaper. My beat was the entire region -- whatever the news was happening -- and since my base was in the heart of the province's potato belt, agriculture topics became regular stories for me.
I think I had about four phone numbers for Patton -- two cell phones, an office number and a direct line. I knew that if I couldn't reach him, he would call me back as soon as he could. I also knew that if I didn't reach him when I needed to, I could keep calling him until I did reach him.
And he knew that he could always call me with story ideas, comments or concerns. He also knew that he could chat and rant and give me the background of an issue without the rant (necessarily) going into print.
We shared a mutual respect.
Here's how the conversations usually went: I would call him to find out about an issue. I would keep calling every hour until I reached him, or he would call me at about 10 p.m. I would ask him a question then listen to him talk for about 45 minutes about matters sort of related to the question, but not really. He was usually on his way someplace and in a hurry. Near the end of the conversation, I would nail down a comment from him about whatever it was that I called to talk about.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say he helped do more for the province's potato industry -- and for that matter -- New Brunswick agriculture -- during his time at the agency than has been done in the last 20 years.
Patton was on top of Canada-United States potato trade issues, negotiating with trade officials for reduced barriers. He promoted farm safety and helped implement a farm equipment signage program. And when New Brunswick potato farmers were faced with labour shortages and were struggling to get their crops in from the fields, he helped set up a labour hotline, which expanded to a rural labour hotline -- helping put farmers and woodlot owners get in touch with willing workers. He was instrumental in starting the New Brunswick Potato Conference, an annual two-day professional development meeting held every February during a snow storm (I never did figure out how he managed that!).
Nothing Patton did was done alone. Whatever project he tackled he had teams working with him and everyone should share the applause. But Patton was a driving force on getting the word out there about agriculture. He didn't create the news, but he championed the work of New Brunswick farmers. Now, it seems, reporters have to go looking for agriculture news.
It's sad when a strong voice is silenced. Even though Patton hadn't been speaking out loudly about New Brunswick agriculture for some time, I hope another champion can be found. Patton can never be replaced, but the work he did helping promote the province's agriculture industry shouldn't be lost.
Monday, October 11, 2010
I am thankful for... turkducken
This weekend, we celebrated Thanksgiving in Canada -- a traditional time to pause and take stock of what's around us and what fills our lives with happiness and peace. It's also a traditional family gathering time.
My father's brothers, their wives, two of my four cousins, their girlfriends, my parents and brother arrived at my house on Saturday afternoon. We had the traditional turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots, peas, squash and gravy simmering away, but I had decided a few weeks ago that we would also cook a turducken -- a cranberry dressing stuffed-chicken, stuffed in a duck, stuffed in a turkey. I had ordered it from the Old Fashion Meat Market a couple of weeks ago and was quite looking forward to five kilograms cooking adventure.
I was assured when I ordered the turduckin they would give me instructions on how to cook the beast, so I wasn't too concerned until I had the prize in my hands and asked for details. The response? "Just like a turkey." Fine, I said, "but tell me more," figuring solid meat must require something extra, right? Cook at 275 F for 5.5 to 6 hours, I was told. OK. Sounds simple, right?
After about two hours, I figured I would be smelling the wonderful scent of roasting turducken, but there was nothing -- I even checked to make sure the oven was on. It was, but I cranked up the heat and stuck the birds back in the oven, knowing the hungry dinner guests would soon arrive.
As the clock approached 3 p.m., we could indeed smell turducken (smells like chicken) wafting through the house. Tummies started to rumble. "What time are we eating?" became a popular question. My answer: "It's all on the turducken at this point." I think they were beginning to eye the dog food...
Sometime in the hustle of the afternoon, I turned the heat up to 400 F and the turducken was done on time. It was a bit dry, but I believe that was because I had to cook it at the higher temperature. I think the meat market made a mistake when they told me to cook it at 275 F and should have instead told me to cook it at 375 F.
Regardless, we certainly didn't go hungry. In fact, we had so much food left over that we had another full meal again on Sunday with other relatives. There were even enough unopened rolls to take to a drop-in centre downtown. I am thankful that I have the means to fill tummies and invite people into my home.
Now, next year... I'm thinking I'll serve tofurkey.
My father's brothers, their wives, two of my four cousins, their girlfriends, my parents and brother arrived at my house on Saturday afternoon. We had the traditional turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots, peas, squash and gravy simmering away, but I had decided a few weeks ago that we would also cook a turducken -- a cranberry dressing stuffed-chicken, stuffed in a duck, stuffed in a turkey. I had ordered it from the Old Fashion Meat Market a couple of weeks ago and was quite looking forward to five kilograms cooking adventure.
Except for the legs and wings of the turkey, the birds are deboned, which I'm sure eases the construction process. It was well sewn together, but when my mother asked me what it looked like, the only description I could think of was "kind of limp."
I was assured when I ordered the turduckin they would give me instructions on how to cook the beast, so I wasn't too concerned until I had the prize in my hands and asked for details. The response? "Just like a turkey." Fine, I said, "but tell me more," figuring solid meat must require something extra, right? Cook at 275 F for 5.5 to 6 hours, I was told. OK. Sounds simple, right?
After about two hours, I figured I would be smelling the wonderful scent of roasting turducken, but there was nothing -- I even checked to make sure the oven was on. It was, but I cranked up the heat and stuck the birds back in the oven, knowing the hungry dinner guests would soon arrive.
As the clock approached 3 p.m., we could indeed smell turducken (smells like chicken) wafting through the house. Tummies started to rumble. "What time are we eating?" became a popular question. My answer: "It's all on the turducken at this point." I think they were beginning to eye the dog food...
Sometime in the hustle of the afternoon, I turned the heat up to 400 F and the turducken was done on time. It was a bit dry, but I believe that was because I had to cook it at the higher temperature. I think the meat market made a mistake when they told me to cook it at 275 F and should have instead told me to cook it at 375 F.
Regardless, we certainly didn't go hungry. In fact, we had so much food left over that we had another full meal again on Sunday with other relatives. There were even enough unopened rolls to take to a drop-in centre downtown. I am thankful that I have the means to fill tummies and invite people into my home.
Now, next year... I'm thinking I'll serve tofurkey.
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