The 2017 Grey Cup of agriculture

Nov 20, 2017

Comparing the provinces each team represents

By Diego Flammini
News Reporter
Farms.com

The Calgary Stampeders and the Toronto Argonauts ate the final teams remaining in the 2017 Canadian Football League playoffs.

The two squads will meet this Sunday in Ottawa, Ont. in the 105^th Grey Cup to determine who is the best team in Canadian football.

While most football analysts use quarterback play, defensive stats and other personnel matchups to determine the winner, here at Farms.com we use the agricultural statistics from each of the represented provinces: Alberta and Ontario.

The information used is from Statistics Canada.

** Signals advantage for each team.

	Alberta	Ontario
CFL Team	Calgary Stampeders	Toronto Agonauts
Number of farms	40,638	49,600**
Acres operated	50,250,000**	12,348,000
Total operators	57,605	70,470**
Acres of land crops	25,300,000**	9,000,000
Average age of principal operator	55.7	55.3**
Average number of beef head per farm (From Beef Farmers of Ontario)	233**	88
Number of pigs as of July 1	1,1490,000	3,443,000**
Number of dairy farms	523	3,613**

Based on our analysis, the Toronto Argonauts have a slight advantage over the Calgary Stampeders heading into the Grey Cup.

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.