People cook food beside their damaged house following rains and floods during Pakistan’s monsoon season at Jafarabad, about 400 km north of Hyderabad, on Aug. 28, 2022. (Photo: Reuters/Amer Hussain)

Produce prices spike in flood-hit Pakistan as food crisis looms

Flooding wrecks crops, hampers logistics

Lahore | Reuters — Vegetable and fruit prices have soared in markets across Pakistan as devastating rains ruin crops and disrupt supplies, an early sign of how the worst floods in decades are creating food shortages at a time of financial crisis. Pakistan’s 220 million people are already facing rampant inflation, with consumer prices up […] Read more

File photo of fresh cherries purchased from an orchard’s roadside stand at Penticton, B.C. (Amy Mitchell/iStock/Getty Images)

B.C. cherries cleared for export to Korea

Canada-Korea free trade pact a step ahead on lower tariffs

Canada’s seven-year-old free trade pact with South Korea already provides for reduced tariffs on cherries from British Columbia — a commodity that’s just been approved for export to Korea for the first time starting this month. Canadian agriculture and food safety officials announced Aug. 10 that talks with Seoul on import rules and certifications had […] Read more



(Glacier FarmMedia staff photo)

Quebec’s UPA hit by ransomware attack

Farm organization, affiliate bodies affected

Quebec’s overarching farmer organization, l’Union des producteurs agricoles (UPA), has confirmed its computer systems were hit by a ransomware attack earlier this month. UPA, in a release last Thursday, said it’s working with a cybersecurity firm to analyze the nature and scope of the attack, as well as any possible solutions to securely restore its […] Read more


File photo of a field of soybeans under turbines at southern Manitoba’s St. Joseph wind farm. (Dougall_Photography/iStock/Getty Images)

Russia to ban some imports of seeds from Canada, Europe

Canada's Prograin soybean seed on list

Moscow | Reuters — Russia will ban imports of some seeds from several locations in Europe and Canada from Aug. 15, its agriculture safety watchdog said on Thursday, citing non-compliance by suppliers with phytosanitary requirements as the reason. Imports of tomato and carrot seeds will be banned from a nursery of Satimex Quedlinburg, in Germany, […] Read more

(SwissChalet.com)

Fairfax proposes takeover of Recipe dining group

Chains include The Keg, Swiss Chalet, Harvey's

Reuters — Recipe Unlimited Corp. said on Tuesday shareholder and investment firm Fairfax Financial Holdings has proposed to take the Canadian restaurant operator private for $1.23 billion, sending its shares up nearly 50 per cent. The offer price marks a premium of more than 53 per cent to Recipe’s last close. The shares have fallen […] Read more


Award-winning Cascadia shows both flowers and forming snap peas. Green edible pods are a nice length, crunchy, sweet and juicy.

Sweet peas, snap peas and shelling peas

Plus, understanding acidity and alkalinity of soil

Let’s plant some edible snap peas and shelling peas. Plus — a bit of this and a bit o’ that. Gardeners phone, others write and I always appreciate face-to-face meetings. Here’s one gardener’s experience with Epsom salt. Tells me he sprays tomato and pepper plants at blossoming time with a weak solution of Epsom salt […] Read more

Smoke billows during a fire in an area of the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, Amazonas State, Brazil on Aug. 14, 2019. (Photo: Reuters/Ueslei Marcelino)

Market value alone is selling nature short, governments told

Economic valuations needed but 'not sufficient,' co-chair says

Reuters — What is the value of a river? Is it for the nutritional content of the fish it sustains? The economic benefit of the local livelihoods it supports? Or does the river have its own value which humans cannot measure? Such questions may seem removed from the issues the world faces, from deepening climate […] Read more



Figure 1. This map is a direct lift from the discussion document on reducing emissions arising from the application of fertilizer in Canada’s agriculture sector.

N2O, a powerful GHG — or is it?

Fertilizers, the big culprits — or are they? Psst! Punchline near the end but no peeking

The major greenhouse gases are CO2 (carbon dioxide), CH4 (methane) and N2O (nitrous oxide). N2O is described as a very strong greenhouse gas that has a warming potential of 298 times that of CO2 according to the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report or 265 times according to the IPCC Fifth Assessment […] Read more