Suffice to say, production manager Rudy Doerwald keeps close tabs on the price of the sweetener, but with just two suppliers to choose from, he has no choice but to take what’s offered.
“The price they dictate is unfortunately the price I have to pay,” he said. “I am just held hostage and there’s not much I can do.”
Threats of decreasing the percentage of Canadian sugar in processed foods and still qualify for a Made-in-Canada food label has stirred strong emotions in southern Alberta’s sugar beet industry
“I am very disappointed to hear that CFIA (Canadian Food Inspection Agency) is reconsidering changes to the food labelling content levels put in place a year ago,” Rob Boras of Iron Springs, president of the Alberta Sugar Beet Growers Marketing Board, said in a letter to Lethbridge Conservative MP Rick Casson.
Casson jumped to the defense of his sugar beet industry.
He can’t understand why the Canadian product content debate has been reopened.
The existing rule says ingredients like sugar in processed foods should be 98 per cent Canadian to qualify for the “Made-in-Canada” product label.
“I want it to stay that way.”
Casson was uncertain the deadline for public comment, but urged a strong letter and e-mail writing campaign to support the southern Alberta sugar industry.
He said the Lantic sugar factory in Taber can be expanded and growers are still looking for a more solid industry.
Boras said there is no doubt, any reduction on the use of Canadian sugar “will impact our sugar beet industry in a negative way.
“With the 'Product-of-Canada' on the label of many foods, including sugar, it was thought that the sugar beet industry would stand some chance of competing with foreign-sourced ingredients,” said Boras. “It helped us remain optimistic about our future.”
Boras said the suggestion from some people that Canadian sugar is difficult to find is not true. Some say proponents of change want the Canadian product limits reduced to 85 per cent and still qualify for the Made-in-Canada product label.
“Alberta produces more sugar than can be consumed in western Canada and in turn has to find export markets.” said Boras. “Why not keep it in Canada instead?
“If those food manufacturers want Canadian-made sugar it can travel across this country quite freely.
“I am also reminded that when we had our roundtable discussion with the minister (Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz) over a year ago, he was very receptive to the idea of home-grown products which promoted both food safety and economic growth. How about sugar?”
Boras asks Casson and his Medicine Hat counterpart Lavar Payne to make Ritz aware that sugar beet growers are very nervous of the consequences that may arise if the levels of content are reduced.
source: lethbridgeherald
An unusually warm winter caused Vancouver Island maple sugar production to fall to 30% of normal levels this year.
Island-made syrup and sugar from big leaf maple trees has seen growing popularity during the past decade but this year's supply was drastically reduced without the cold weather that makes trees send sap upward into the trunk.
For the Sapsuckers, a loose-knit group of maple sugar producers between Victoria and Campbell River, the results have been disappointing.
The fledgling sugar industry is so new to the Island there is insufficient data to know whether warm temperatures are responsible, but no one remembers this happening before.
"It's El Nino," said Gary Backlund of Ladysmith. "It was a real poor season. The sap was really dark."
Sap is the maple tree's natural antifreeze when temperatures drop below -4 C and this winter that only happened briefly in December.
"We've talked to other people who have been doing this a lot longer and they said this is the worst year ever."
Most people associate maple sugar with eastern Canada, but the big leaf maple is said to have considerable potential to expand sugar production in the West. The trees are the second-most abundant hardwood in North America.
The sap has more flavour than eastern sugar maples, but this year it was "a little too strong" for pancakes, Backlund said.
With El Nino typically cycling every 10 or 11 years, it's seen as a minor setback.
"I think it has a huge future," Backlund said.
He predicts niche tourist markets in future to include maple beer and wine and maple extract.
Island-made syrup is only sold privately, either directly from producers or at the annual maple sugar festival at the Duncan Forestry Discovery Centre.
source: canada
Southern Alberta’s sugar beet farmers are expected to claw back this year after a devastating weather-wreaked crop in 2009.Grower official Rob Boras of Picture Butte said he expects most of the 200 farmers, most with years of sugar beet production experience, “Are ready to go at it again this year.”
With a normal crop in the midst of harvest, Mother Nature turned nasty Oct. 4, hitting most of the sugar beet production zone with rain, snow, and cold and freezing weather.
Lantic Sugar and its field staff and Taber factory crew worked in co-operation with Boras’ Alberta Sugar Beet Growers Marketing Board to harvest and process as many beets as possible before the hammer came down on operations, leaving about 6,500 acres of unharvested beets to clean up for 2010 farming operations.
Losses were reduced for growers who purchased crop insurance, but armed with a new three-year production contract in 2009 with Lantic, producers were expecting some of the best prices in years, partly because of the highest world sugar prices in 20 years.
Boras said the industry was predicting an average yield of 24 tonnes an acre, and farmer returns before expenses could have hit $50 a tonne. Using those figures, the potential loss without crop insurance on 6,500 acres would have been $7.8 million.
Boras said the biggest disappointment was the inability of all growers to capitalize on the excellent beet price for the 2009 crop.
“But that is the way it goes,” he said. “It is not always like that and I think most growers will shrug it off and rise to the challenge.”
He said some new sugar beet varieties have been approved fro the 2010 crop and growers hope they will help promote the industry.
Boras said opportunity for new sugar beet growers in 2010 remains at the behest of Lantic Sugar and its ability to create market share for beet sugar. Lantic Sugar allocates production acres and the marketing board distributes those acres among growers. With the large percentage of the crop left unprocessed, Lantic Sugar could face a sugar shortfall this year he said. The could encourage increased beet acres.
“Until Lantic Sugar says it needs a lot more sugar, we will make production adjustments as we go,” said Boras.
He added it is unlikely the poor production scene in 2009 will be enough to force or encourage sugar beet growers to leave the industry.
“There are always guys exploring when they want to get out of beets.”
Boras said most growers have faced production diversity before, “but we have a devoted group in this industry I feel will hang in ‘til the bitter end.”
source: sunnysouthnews
A Canada-Colombia free trade deal before the House of Commons could close down the southern Alberta sugar beet industry, a sugar industry official warns.
Canadian Sugar Institute president Sandra Marsden told MPs Oct. 27 that the proposed deal, now stalled in the House of Commons in an NDP-Bloc Québécois filibuster over the Colombian human rights record, would open the Canadian industry to damaging new competition.
source: producer
ONTARIO — A federal judge’s ruling to overturn the use of sugar beets genetically engineered to resist the Roundup weed killer could be a major blow to the sugar industry in the Treasure Valley if the decision stands.
Producers involved in the sugar beet industry said the decision may force farmers to rethink the feasibility of growing beets if they have to return to conventional seed.
For now, though, it is too early in the legal process to know the final outcome.
At least one local farmer said a program to embrace conventional techniques for sugar beets is problematic.
“It would be difficult to go back to conventional beets,” Reid Saito, Nyssa farmer said. “It would require growers to use a lot more chemicals. Some weeds we never could get a handle on.”
The genetically-engineered seed produces beets that are not affected when growers use Roundup to kill weeds. With the Roundup Ready beets, farmers are able to keep their fields cleaner, Saito said.
“It has been a real boon for growers,” Lynn Jensen, Malheur County Extension agent, said. “Weed control is a tough issue in sugar beets.”
The new technology reduced the amount of chemicals used on beets and eliminated most hand labor, Jensen said.
U.S. District Judge Jeffery White, San Francisco, ruled that allowing the use of Roundup Ready beets violated environmental law by failing to take a “hard look” at whether those beets would share their genes with other crops. He ordered the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service to write an environmental impact statement, he said.
Saito and Jensen said if they have to go back to conventional beet seed, farmers may seriously ponder whether they can continue to grow beets.
A sugar industry spokesperson agreed and did not want to speculate about what the judge may decide.
“First of all, it does not have any effect on the crop now being harvested,” Luther Markwart, American Sugar Beet Growers Association, who is the designated spokesperson for the sugar beet processors, said.
The next action is Oct. 30, which will be the scheduling session for the remedy phase of the litigation, during which the parties involved will learn what the judge decides needs to be done.
“We don’t know what that is,” Markwart said “Or how long it will take.” Markwart said the decision impacts most of the sugar beet trade.
“We have an industry that is 95 percent planting Roundup Ready beets,” he said, and by 2010 there was expected to be a full conversion.
In some growing areas there are still some disease issues, Markwart said.
One major question is whether there will be enough conventional beet seed, if the genetically engineered beets are not allowed.
“That is the big question,” Markwart said. “I don’t have the answer. They don’t share that information,” he said, referring to the seed companies, adding that is proprietary information.
“Probably only the government could obtain it,’ he said. “Nobody in the industry can do that.”
The judge’s ruling came about 20 months into the case, Markwart said and that it was a disappointment rather than a surprise. The beet growers association is putting together its case in defending the growers’ right to have the opportunity to use the new technology, he said.
Whether there is an appeal will be up to the government. The industry was not a party to the case.
source: argusobserver
The Department of Science and Technology (DoST) has developed standards for muscovado sugar production that would ensure a steady export market in Asia, Europe and North America.
DoST's Industrial Technology Development Institute (ITDI) has standardized the local muscovado production process to ensure the quality of muscovado sugar being exported abroad.
ITDI experts said the standards developed started from the cutting of the stalk, harvesting, up to the production of muscovado sugar. They said standards include the need for processing control to eradicate dirt; following good manufacturing practices (GMP) covering personnel, buildings and facilities, equipment and utensils, water supply, and processes. Sugar canes should also be milled within 16 hours to avoid contamination.
ITDI came up with standards for muscovado sugar production after survey revealed that most muscovado milers do not meet international requirements, particularly the limited volume, high moisture content, high microbial load, color inconsistency, and short shelf life.
ITDI also introduced modern processing as traditional processing of muscovado sugar is 50 percent less efficient.
Premium muscovado sugar is golden brown to dark brown in color. It contains 1.5 to 3.5 percent moisture content and has a shelf life of at least nine months to four years.
Compared to white sugar's four calories per gram (cal/g), muscovado sugar or unrefined cane sugar is healthier as it only contains 2.75 cal/g. It also contains 187 grams of calcium, 56 grams of phosphorus, 4.8 grams of iron, 757 grams of potassium, and 97 grams of sodium. It is in demand in countries like Japan, Germany, Italy, France, South Korea, USA, Malaysia, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Switzerland, and United Kingdom.
ITDI's standardization of muscovado sugar production was done in partnership with sister agency Philippine Council for Industry and Energy Research and Development (PCIERD), particularly on production process, cleaner production technologies, and promotions and awareness programs.
Muscovado exports jumped from 405 metric tons (MT) in 1997 to 1,186 MT in 2006. Antique province alone ships out some 150 MT of muscovado sugar every year.
source: mb.com
Southern Alberta
Officials of the southern Alberta sugar beet industry will meet to discuss the use of RoundUp Ready or genetically-modified sugar beets resistant to the Monsanto Canada-made herbicide. A committee of two each from the Alberta Sugar Beet Growers Marketing Board and Lantic Sugar, which owns the Taber beet factory that produces Rogers Sugar, will meet.
Doug Emek of Taber, supervisor for both the Taber Lantic sugar beet operation and a cane sugar factory in Vancouver, said the company and marketing board have been talking about the crop “for some time.”
A lobby organization, through Cban e-News, sparked the recent move when it issued a news release asking the public to urge Lantic Sugar and southern Alberta farmers to ban the GM beets.
The release says Canadian sugar company Lantic Inc. (Rogers Sugar and Lantic brands) is deciding right now to accept or reject Monsanto’s genetically-modified sugar beet. Lantic Inc. is the only sugar company in Canada which processes sugar beets (grown in Alberta), but the GM sugar beet will only be planted if Lantic allows it. Lantic sugar is currently GM-free.
The issue boils done to competition.
Emek said the American beet sugar industry, with about 600,000 acres, mostly in North Dakota and Minnesota which have three sugar companies operating seven factories, grew about 60 per cent of the 2008 U.S. crop with GM beet varieties.
It is expected the U.S. will plant up to 90 per cent of this year’s crop with GM varieties.
“We all want southern Alberta to be able to compete (with the American industry),” said Emek.
The key to these GM varieties is the ability to find ways to more easily and environmentally-friendly control weeds during the sugar beet growing season, said Emek. They require less cultivation and spraying which reduces the greenhouse gases produced by the tractors.
RoundUp is one herbicide which, upon contact with the soil, quickly breaks down into its component parts.
Emek said several independent tests have been done on granular sugar processed from traditional sugar beet varieties and GM varieties.
“The sugar is not changed at all.”
He said while RoundUp Ready sugar beet varieties are more environmentally-friendly, they also improve the efficiency of producing sugar.
source: prairiepost
What could have been a sour spring for local beet growers got a lot sweeter last Wednesday afternoon.
At about 2 p.m. that day, a three-year contract was struck between the Alberta Sugar Beet Growers Marketing Board and Lantic Sugar Inc. The deal follows up on the one-year pact signed last year.
According to Rob Boras, the newly-elected president of the marketing board, the time was right to get the deal completed.
“We sat down at the (Lethbridge) Lodge and felt time was of the essence,” he said, and added it is nice to have a longer-term deal in place this time. “It’s always better to have it three years because it takes a lot of time and effort and money to put together.”
Boras added it is a short turnaround from last year to this year, as the board has operated in a near-constant cycle of negotiation in the last few years, with last year’s one-year deal.
“I guess the way we looked at it was it was something the board had to do last year. We didn’t want to lock into a contract that didn’t give us profitability.”
With many of the same board members on hand this year that helped negotiate the last contract, Boras said the process benefited from that continuity.
“There were several directors on the board that really stepped up to the plate.”
Now those directors, and the rest of southern Alberta’s beet growers, can rest a little easier, knowing beets will be grown in this area for another three years.
Boras added the deal provides stability, and piece of mind for both the growers and Lantic Sugar Inc., as everyone now knows at least a ballpark figure as to how many acres of beets will be grown this season.
“We’re going to be looking at a minimum of 30,000 acres this year. It could go up but we have been guaranteed 30,000 acres to start.”
What could impact that in the future is the new Flexible Solutions plant in Taber, which should be up operational later this year, according to the company’s CEO, Dan O’Brien.
“We’re installing the equipment now and we will be doing some test runs in the summer and then we should be up and running in the fall,” said O’Brien, who added the facility will begin by using 2,000-5,000 tonnes of sugar equivalent product from Lantic Sugar Inc. “It doesn’t affect their acres quite yet — it’s just a nice extra sale.”
Boras said the marketing board is not directly dealing with Flexible Solutions, and added at this point, the new company in Taber is simply taking sugar products from Lantic.
He went on to say down the road, Flexible Solutions will help in moving volumes of sugar produced here in southern Alberta, which should also benefit from the new three-year deal.
“What we have done here in guarantee them (Flexible Solutions) at least three years of the feedstock they came to Taber for, and I think that gives them a bit of piece of mind.”
Boras added he is hopeful the Flexible Solutions facility will take off in the future.
While the success of Flexible Solutions in the future can only help the local sugar industry, Boras said the big thing now is a new deal is done, and everyone in southern Alberta can get back to the business of producing sugar.
“There are a lot of livelihoods involved in this, so we worked really hard to pull together a contract we could live with over the next three years.”
He added the focus was to negotiate a deal which was good for both sides, to ensure the profitability for both the growers and for Lantic. However, for the growers specifically, there is one important element in the new deal. Boras said a clause exists in the new deal that allows for growers to experience an upside, indexed to the world sugar price. He added growers will not simply be tied into a fixed price for the life of the contract.
“If we see something going up there, we have some upside potential which we didn’t have before.”
Boras added that upside potential was key for growers in this contract, and paved the way for a longer-term agreement.
Andrew Llewelyn-Jones, agricultural superintendent at Lantic, was also pleased to see the three-year agreement.
“For everybody from the company and the growers, it shows we are committed to keeping the industry in the area.”
He added the deal also gives Lantic the stability it requires to invest in improvements to the Taber factory over the next few years.
For Boras and the marketing board, now that the new deal is in place, a shift in focus will take place to general promotion of the sugar industry. He added that will be done through meeting with federal, provincial and local political leaders.
“They need to know what this industry is all about and where we stand.”
Boras and the rest of the board will also focus this month on hiring a new general manager for the organization, to replace the departed Bruce Webster, who served as GM for 16 years.
“Without a manager, there is a void we need filled, and it’s in the hands of a hiring committee, and we’re receiving applications every day.”
Once that manager is in place, they will work with Boras and the board to prepare for an important legal battle in 2010. According to Boras, that is when the Canadian sugar industry will have to defend its tariff that protects the domestic sugar market. The tariff has to be defended every five years.
“We’re in the early stages of preparing for that. We will need to hire a lawyer to help take care of that.”
Closer to home, growers in Taber will likely be out in the fields, weather permitting, in early April. Boras added growers in his area, near Picture Butte, are typically out about 10 days to two weeks after their Taber counterparts.
“That’s why we needed to get this deal done,” said Boras of the impended seeding campaign. “There’s other crops that compete with us, so that’s why we felt we needed to get this done.”
Production-intention forms will soon be coming to all sugar beet quota holders and according to Llewelyn-Jones, Lantic is now in the process of bringing in seed. The company will probably start the contracting process the first week of April.
Before then, Llewelyn-Jones added Lantic will host grower-information sessions March 24-27 in Taber, Burdett, Vauxhall and Lethbridge
Click to read full story
source: vauxhalladvance
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