Publications

Drones Hit New Turf: U.S. Farmland – May 7, 2013
Farmers are starting to investigate the use of drones for a decidedly nonmilitary purpose: monitoring crops and spraying pesticides. As the spring growing season unfolds, universities already are working with agricultural groups to experiment with different types of unmanned aircraft outfitted with sensors and other technologies to measure and protect crop health.

What We Can Learn About Open Markets From Wine and Wheat – April 24, 2013
Canadian history is filled with tales of protected industries destined for oblivion because of free trade, foreign threats or lost subsidies. But the worst-case scenario rarely plays out as predicted. Consider two prominent examples from the past quarter-century: the advent of free trade for Ontario’s wine industry and the end of the subsidized freight rates for Western grain farmers. In both cases, disaster was predicted. Yet both sectors adapted and emerged stronger.

Government Must Stand up for Farmers and Commit to Ending Supply Management – March 25, 2013
Martha Hall Findlay has brought attention to Canada’s system of supply management; a system in which production quotas are allocated to dairy, poultry, turkey and egg farmers, and prices are set by their respective marketing boards. Farmers themselves are the victims of this status quo – particularly export dependent producers in Western Canada.

Canada's Supply-Managed Stranglehold – March 25, 2013
Critics of supply management have typically focused on the high cost paid by consumers. Cami's predicament demonstrates how lost export opportunities and the stifling of agricultural innovation is harming a much broader swath of the economy. Supply management is sapping economic growth, jobs and productivity, up and down the food chain, not to mention the hit on government revenues.

Hunting for Habitat: On the Private Production of Ecological Goods and Services (Knopff) – March 22, 2013
PowerPoint slides which accompanied Rainer Knopff's speech Hunting for Habitat: On the Private Production of Ecological Goods and Services that he gave in Calgary on February 28, 2013.

The Supply Management Cartel: – March 8, 2013
Eric Merkley shows that Canada’s supply management system stands in need of reform, and considers how the political obstacles to change can be overcome.

Media Release - The Private Production of Ecological Goods and Services – February 28, 2013
A new study by the Frontier Centre looks back at a 2008 Alberta proposal that sought to compensate private landowners for protecting habitat for wildlife and argues that the widely-misunderstood proposal was a great way to balance competing public and private interests.

How would Canadian Prairie Agri-Business deal with a Dalton Minimum Repeat? – January 31, 2013
Ray Garnett analyzes recent data and discusses the role that solar activity plays in shaping summer climates in the Prairie Provinces.

Mark Lynas - Lecture to Oxford Farming Conference – January 17, 2013
I want to start with some apologies. For the record, here and upfront, I apologise for having spent several years ripping up GM crops. I am also sorry that I helped to start the anti-GM movement back in the mid 1990s, and that I thereby assisted in demonising an important technological option which can be used to benefit the environment.

Canada’s Organic Food System is a Nightmare – January 3, 2013
Canadians are bombarded with messages that organic food is purer, tastier, and more nutritious. However, an in-depth report indicates that there is no systematic, empirical proof that it is any of these things. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency does not test organic food before certifying it.

Pierre Desrochers, B.A., M.A., Ph.D. – November 7, 2012
The Frontier Centre interviewed Pierre Desrochers in Calgary on October 25,2012. His unique strength as one of the most well-known critics of the locavore movement is his knowledge of a broader set of issues than other critics who have attacked only one facet of this movement.

Media Release - Canada’s Organic Certification System is an Emperor with No Clothes – November 1, 2012
Canada lacks a system for testing organic products, making the system open to abuse, conflict of interest situations and foreign exploitation.

Canada’s Organic Nightmare – November 1, 2012
This study exposes serious shortcomings in Canada’s organic food industry given the absence of a systematic testing system.

Stop Feeling Sorry for Farmers – September 12, 2012
Everyone feels sorry for farmers when they are hit with a disaster like this summer’s drought. Politicians are called on to do even more to supplement government’s generous support programs, and no one much questions it.

How Much You Wanna Bet – September 6, 2012
I'll bet you didn't know that the majority of the certified-organic food sold in this country is imported. Brokers in places like China have figured out that all we require is paperwork to "prove" a crop is genuinely organic. And, speaking of China, were you aware that only Chinese inspectors who are active members of The Communist Party of China are allowed to inspect Chinese farms, in spite of the fact that it's USDA and CFIA certification being granted? Who came up with that lame idea?

The Future of Farming – September 3, 2012
Tomorrow’s farming will look like today’s, only more so. Crop and livestock yields per acre must triple again to protect wildlife habitat. Biotechnology will be increasingly vital. Confinement feeding will be even more important, to leave room for wildlife. Organic will prove to be a fad, as will locovores and vegetarians. Activists will be less credible than over the past 50 years.

Manitoba Fishers Protest Massive Seizure of Mullet – August 18, 2012
A group of about 35 western Manitoba fishers demonstrated in front of the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corp.'s Transcona plant Monday, protesting the federal agency's seizure last week of mullet destined for Illinois.

Charting the Course to True Free Trade – July 16, 2012
Not many New Zealanders might have realised, until reading the Weekend Herald, how important a role their country is playing in talks to liberalise international trade

Time to End Supply Management – But it won’t go Quietly – July 6, 2012
For a brief, shining moment in the early 2000s, Canada had a small but thriving milk export business. Georgian Bay Milk Co., based in Barrie, Ont., would buy milk from a clutch of farmers operating outside Canada’s tightly controlled supply managed dairy industry and ship it to dairies in New York state.

Beyond Supply Management – March 30, 2012
Canada’s dairy industry is not currently well-positioned to succeed in increasingly liberalized international markets and policy reforms are currently needed to insure competitiveness in the future.