Organizers are hoping the international grain market spotlight will be on Canada this week as a new event - the Canadian Global Crops Symposium - kicks off tonight in Winnipeg.
"The real goal here is to showcase Canada to the world," says Canada Grains Council president Richard Phillips.
He says industry and farm leaders felt Canada should host an event to bring together the Canadian crop supply chain with international buyers.
"In every other major grain-producing country in the world, they have a big international conference where they invite all their customers to come in and they showcase the quality of their grain, the volumes of their grain and the infrastructure they have for that - all to try to entice more sales," explains Phillips. "Canada really doesn't have one of those, so we've put together this conference."
As of Friday, around 235 individuals were registered to attend, including representatives from foreign customers, as well as railway officials, Canadian grain company executives and farm group leaders.
Cargill, Inc. president and CEO Gregory Page is the opening keynote speaker on Tuesday morning - his first time speaking in Canada. Speaker panels will be discussing topics including grain logistics, growing global demand and seed technology.
Phillips says they hope to make it an annual event.
"Every large foreign grain buyer in the world, we want them to put Canada on their calendar for early April. Come see what we have going into the ground, how our logistics are working and what our quality looks like. They can tour Cigi, the Canadian Grain Commission, maybe stop at some grain company head offices, whatever we can do to sell more Canadian grain in the world," he says.
Source: PortageOnline