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Alberta

Prairie farmers hope for ‘normal’ season after volatile couple of years

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CALGARY — Third-generation farmer Greg Sears is more than ready for a crop year without any curve balls in it.

In 2021, farmers were thrown a big one in the form of the severe drought that withered crops across Western Canada, including on Sears’ farm just north of Grande Prairie, Alta.

Then last year — even as the war in Ukraine drove grain and oilseed prices to record highs — inflationary pressures led to dramatic spikes in the cost of everything from fertilizer to fuel to tractor tires, leading some in the industry to dub 2022 as the most expensive crop year in history.

“Roller coaster ride, is a good way to describe it,” said Sears, of the volatility that has affected Canadian agriculture in the last 24 months.

“I’m kind of hoping (2023) will be, for what it amounts to, a normal year.”

Sears made the comments in a recent interview from his farm, where the weather has only recently changed to what he describes as “spring-ish” conditions.

While it will likely still be a few weeks before his fields dry up enough to start seeding his wheat, barley and canola, Sears said he feels a mix of hope and “nervous anticipation.”

On one hand, crop prices remain high from a historical perspective — though not as high as last year — and Canadian farmers are eager to meet the growing global demand for food.

“Most indications suggest farmers are going to hit the fields hard this year, with planted acreage expected to be a near record,” Edward Jones analyst Steve Hansen wrote in a recent research note, in which he suggested that if everything goes well, Canadian farmers could deliver a “Top 5 harvest” this fall.

But the memory of 2021’s record-breaking heat and drought in Western Canada weighs on many farmers who experienced it.

“We used to have a certain expectation for what our worst-case scenario was, and 2021 really reset that limit,” Sears said.

“We were affected as much as anybody. It wasn’t a very good scene for most people in our area.”

While 2021 was the worst one, western farmers have suffered through multiple drier-than-average growing seasons in the past decade.

And as of the end of February, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s drought monitor map shows vast swathes of B.C., Alberta and Saskatchewan as being “abnormally dry” or already in a drought condition.

That’s a worry, Sears said.

“We haven’t really had good solid rains to build up the subsoil moisture again,” he added.

“And we didn’t get the big, big snows that we typically get in February or March. It was pretty sparse.”

Another concern is inflation, which Farm Credit Canada chief economist J.P Gervais said could impact farm profitability this year. While fertilizer and diesel costs have come down somewhat from last year, they remain historically high. And interest rates are much higher than they were at this point in 2022, which will be an issue for some farmers.

“The financial health of some operations depends on ‘do you own your land, and how much interest payments do you have to pay on that land?’” Gervais said.

“Certainly a concern for producers is that input costs are going to be very high this year overall,” said Bill Prybylski, who farms near the city of Yorkton in southeast Saskatchewan.

But Prybylski, who is heading into his 41st year of farming, said he believes most producers in his area are optimistic in spite of the risks.

“I think we’re looking at having a pretty start to the crop year here,” he said.

“But obviously a lot can happen between now and harvest.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 17, 2023.

Amanda Stephenson, The Canadian Press

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Alberta

Alberta introduces bill banning sex reassignment surgery on minors

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Alberta Conservative Premier Danielle Smith followed through on a promised bill banning so-called ‘top and bottom’ surgeries for minors.

Alberta Conservative Premier Danielle Smith made good on her promise to protect kids from extreme transgender ideology after introducing a bill banning so-called “top and bottom” surgeries for minors.

“It is so important that all youth can enter adulthood equipped to make adult decisions. In order to do that, we need to preserve their ability to make those decisions, and that’s what we’re doing,” Smith said in a press release.

“The changes we’re introducing are founded on compassion and science, both of which are vital for the development of youth throughout a time that can be difficult and confusing.”

Bill 26, the Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2024 “reflects the government’s commitment to build a health care system that responds to the changing needs of Albertans,” the government says.

The bill will amend the Health Act to “prohibit regulated health professionals from performing sex reassignment surgeries on minors.”

It will also ban the “use of puberty blockers and hormone therapies for the treatment of gender dysphoria or gender incongruence” to kids 15 and under “except for those who have already commenced treatment and would allow for minors aged 16 and 17 to choose to commence puberty blockers and hormone therapies for gender reassignment and affirmation purposes with parental, physician and psychologist approval.”

Alberta Minister of Health Adriana LaGrange, the bill’s sponsor, said the province’s legislative priorities include “implementing policy changes to continue our refocusing work, position our health care system to respond to pressures and public health emergencies, and to preserve choice for minors. These amendments reflect our dedication to ensuring our health care system meets the needs of every Albertan.”

Earlier this year, the United Conservative Party (UCP) provincial government under Smith announced  she would introduce the strong pro-family legislation that strengthens parental rights, protecting kids from life-altering, so-called “top and bottom” surgeries as well as other extreme forms of transgender ideology.

With Smith’s UCP holding a majority in the provincial legislature, the passage of Bill 26 is almost certain.

While Smith has done far more than predecessor Jason Kenney to satisfy social conservatives, she has been mostly soft on social issues such as abortion and has publicly expressed pro-LGBT views, telling Jordan Peterson that conservatives must embrace homosexual “couples” as “nuclear families.”

This weekend, thousands of UCP members will gather for the party’s annual general meeting, where Smith’s leadership will be voted on along with many other pro-freedom and family policy proposals from members. Smith is expected to pass her leadership review vote with a large majority.

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Alberta

Alberta court upholds conviction of Pastor Artur Pawlowski for preaching at Freedom Convoy protest

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

Lawyers argued that Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s sermon was intended to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, but the statement was characterized as a call for mischief.

An Alberta Court of Appeal ruled that Calgary Pastor Artur Pawlowski is guilty of mischief for his sermon at the Freedom Convoy-related border protest blockade in February 2022 in Coutts, Alberta.

On October 29, Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Gordon Krinke sentenced the pro-freedom pastor to 60 days in jail for “counselling mischief” by encouraging protesters to continue blocking Highway 4 to protest COVID mandates.

“A reasonable person would understand the appellant’s speech to be an active inducement of the illegal activity that was ongoing and that the appellant intended for his speech to be so understood,” the decision reads.

Pawlowski addressed a group of truckers and protesters blocking entrance into the U.S. state of Montana on February 3, the fifth day of the Freedom Convoy-styled protest. He encouraged the protesters to “hold the line” after they had reportedly made a deal with Royal Canadian Mounted Police to leave the border crossing and travel to Edmonton.

“The eyes of the world are fixed right here on you guys. You are the heroes,” Pawlowski said. “Don’t you dare go breaking the line.”

After Pawlowski’s sermon, the protesters remained at the border crossing for two additional weeks. While his lawyers argued that his speech was made to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, the statement is being characterized as a call for mischief.

Days later, on February 8, Pawlowski was arrested – for the fifth time – by an undercover SWAT team just before he was slated to speak again to the Coutts protesters.

He was subsequently jailed for nearly three months for what he said was for speaking out against COVID mandates, the subject of all the Freedom Convoy-related protests.

In Krinke’s decision, he argued that Pawlowski’s sermon incited the continuation of the protest, saying, “The Charter does not provide justification to anybody who incites a third party to commit such crimes.”

“While the appellant is correct that peaceful, lawful and nonviolent communication is entitled to protection, blockading a highway is an inherently aggressive and potentially violent form of conduct, designed to intimidate and impede the movement of third parties,” he wrote.

Pawlowski was released after the verdict. He has already spent 78 days in jail before the trial.

Pawlowski is the first Albertan to be charged for violating the province’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act (CIDA), which was put in place in 2020 under then-Premier Jason Kenney.

The CIDA, however, was not put in place due to COVID mandates but rather after anti-pipeline protesters blockaded key infrastructure points such as railway lines in Alberta a few years ago.

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