Agriculture

REGINA — Will Robbins has been in the process of taking over his family farm southwest of Saskatoon. The 43-year-old grows organic wheat, oats, lentils, peas and occasionally flax and mustard on 445 hectares of land near Laura, Sask.

MACKLIN, SASKATCHEWAN, CANADA — A string of suspected arsons on hay bales, grass and crops around a west-central Saskatchewan town has been both agitating and perplexing, says the local fire chief. It has also prompted a $20,000 reward.

PENTICTON, B.C.

Extreme weather events like fires, floods, heat waves and droughts pose an increasing risk to Canada’s food supply chain, putting pressure on prices all the way to the grocery store shelf, say experts.

With less than a week to go before gala apples will be ready to be picked in British Columbia, the president of the provincial fruit growers' group worries about a devastating season without a way for farmers to refrigerate their crops.

MONTREAL — Saputo Inc. reported a profit of $142 million in its latest quarter as its revenue rose nearly 10 per cent compared with a year ago.

Maple Leaf Foods Inc. reported a loss of $26.2 million in its latest quarter compared with a loss of $53.7 million a year earlier as it prepares to spin off its pork business. The Mississauga, Ont.

OTTAWA — On the western side of Major's Hill Park, tall stalks of corn wave in the breeze from planters overlooking the place where the Rideau Canal empties into the Ottawa River.

OTTAWA — A third of all agriculture jobs in Canada could be automated within the next decade, according to a new report.

OKANAGAN, B.C. — The end of a co-operative that helped farmers process, store and get their fruit to market will be hard on small operations, says one of the farmers in British Columbia’s Okanagan that have been left reeling from the news.