Supporting development of risk management tools

The federal AgriRisk Initiatives Program is now accepting new applications to support the development of new risk management tools for the agriculture sector.

 

Renewed under the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, the program will prioritize proposals involving new financial tools allowing agricultural producers to manage a defined business risk. In addition, for minor and emerging agricultural sectors, support will be available for the development of risk assessments and educational tools to help producers manage risk.

 

Eligible activities include data collection, analysis and modeling, as well as testing of financial tools. Issues that can be addressed include responding to disease in crops, protecting producers from market price fluctuations, coverage for revenue risk and protecting against loss from contracts in new markets. Financial tools include insurance products, options / futures / price pooling and other hedging tools.

 

"Canada's agricultural industry is vital to our economy yet our producers face challenges beyond our control. That is why I am pleased to be offering a program that can help producers develop new risk management tools that will help them meet these challenges,” says Marie Claude Bibeau, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

 

Eligible applicants will be able to apply for funding through the Research and Development stream of the program, one of three components of the AgriRisk Initiatives program. Eligible applicants are not-for-profit organizations, including industry groups, Indigenous groups, and cooperatives, mutual insurance companies or reciprocals.

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.