Our zeal for local food is making us look more closely at what we buy – isn’t it? Intrinsically, I think so. But new economic information from the U.S. makes me wonder if we’re reading stickers and labels. Last week, U.S....
Read MoreWhen human disaster such as the unrelenting famine in the Horn of Africa hits, aid is the immediate answer. More than 12 million people are starving and need our support to secure food, medicine, shelter and water. Those who...
Read MoreIt’s the nature of news—what’s hot today usually disappears tomorrow. Such was the case a year or so ago with the Canadian Field Crop Research Alliance, a coming together of field crop research interests in Manitoba,...
Read MoreA mandated, mandatory election such as the one Ontario will experience this fall takes the spontaneity out of campaigning. But does it ever help with planning. Case in point is the way farmers have prepared for the October 6...
Read MoreWith United States administrators having co-operated at the 11th hour to raise the debt ceiling, the jockeying has started to decide who and what will be spared from the reported trillions of dollars that will be cut to curb...
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Owen Roberts is a faculty member in the Agricultural Leadership, Education and Communications program at the University of Illinois. As an agricultural journalist, he is the past president of the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists and a lifetime achievement award recipient from the Canadian Farm Writers' Federation. His programs and research papers have been recognized nationally and internationally through awards from the Journal of Applied Communications, the National Agri-Marketing Association, the Association for Communications Excellence, and others.