Sunday, September 14, 2014

More photos from Europe

Big Ben, London, UK
Tower of London with WWI commemorative art installation

Hampton Court; Clock from King Henry VIII
Hampton Court Gardens, UK

Kitchen at Hampton Court

Drogheda, Ireland


IVERK Show, Piltown, Ireland

In front of the Louvre in the rain, Paris with a bus.


Vitre, France

Vitre, France architecture

Charolais Show, France

Bourges Cathedral, France

Deauville, France

Hotel in Deauville.

Monday, September 8, 2014

A Connection to Food Like No Other

In France especially but throughout Europe I find that consumers have a different relationship with food.  The savour it, take time to enjoy it and it has a much more regional basis to it.  I have not had a meal in France that was less than three courses.  The food and the regions have a notoriety to them.  That is ultimately one of the reasons why I am in France, to learn about European consumers one must visit the country that is know around the world for their fine cuisine.  I have found on this trip and others that I have taken to Europe that consumers want to eat food produced in the region they are living in or visiting.  A number of years ago I visited Belgium because why wouldn’t I want to go to a place that is internationally recognized for their beer, french fries and chocolate.  The regional pride in food in similar to Canadian’s loyalty to our team of choice.  

There is a pride in Normandy for example, that their food products; meat, cheese, caramel sauce in their opinion is the best.  They show off their products in restaurants and stores, competitions are held and ribbons and trophies are displayed in butcher shop windows and hung on the wall of the restaurants.  There is a loyalty to the traditions and an innovative spirit to work towards perfection.

I saw this in Northern Ireland as well with Food NI’s Taste of Ulster program.  This program publishes a list around 150 restaurants in Ulster each year that use a high proportion of locally sourced food products.  Annually, the establishments are inspected and audited to ensure they are of the highest standard and truly sourcing certain proportions of their products from Northern Ireland.  Taste of Ulster also works with farmers and suppliers to highlight their specific product and make the connections to the retail and food service providers when necessary.  

The Back British Farming campaign by the National Farmers Union (NFU) in the United Kingdom is doing something different yet similar.  They work to increase public awareness of what food is produced in the country and encourage consumers to ask for British produced products.  They are encouraging and maintaining the demand for locally produced food products.  They also have a verification program called Red Tractor Assurance to ensure the highest standards are used to maintain quality and confidence.



PGI (Protected Geographical Indicator) and PDO's (Protected Designation of Origin) are a big part of this. Since 1992, PGI's are a way to ensure that foods or food products originating in a certain region can only be labelled as such when produced within that geographic region.  Champagne is a perfect example; only grapes grown in the Champagne region of France can be labelled as such.  Products originating from a different region must be called Sparkling Wine.  This law allows producers of specific products to obtain a premium price for their authentic products and ensure that regional branding is maintained and that there is no opportunity for copycat products of possible inferior quality to enter the market place.  


In the end, all of these programs are about a brand.  Branding of agricultural products will be the key moving forward.  Historically the farming community as a whole has not been great at telling our story and a brand is largely about the story behind it.  This is starting to change and change is welcomed by those in the industry and by the consumers.  These three regions are prime examples of how it can be done successfully and can be tailored to individual needs.  The strong ties to specific regions in Europe means that it must be done at this level to have the most impact.  At home perhaps the best approach would be to have greater Canadian branding on products but I feel that an argument can be made that in the Maritimes there could be a regionally based program and be very successful with it.  Either way something needs to be researched, investigated and steps need to be taken to strengthen the relationship with our most important customers, those at home in Canada.  We are lucky to have great support from them especially in the meat industry and we need to ensure that they continually have the best Canadian products available to them. We also have the ability to showcase our beef, milk, cheese, bread etc to visitors and to the world.  Let’s make it easy for them to identify Canadian made and produced products so they can help us spread the word.  A strong brand at home will be crucial to having a strong brand internationally. 

Saturday, September 6, 2014

Traceability in the EU



While I don’t claim to understand the subtle differences in the traceability systems in each of the European Union countries nor did I have the time on this trip to dive in to get that much detail.  I have come away from this trip with a better understanding of the system as a whole and a good understanding of the Irish, UK and French methods.  
The ear tags are all similar, produced by Allflex and 2 tags in each animal are required.  The tags are individually numbered and includes a herd identification component.  Some countries use barcodes, electronic identification (EID) is not mandatory but is available to be used for on-farm management.  The places without barcoded tags or in the cases of the older cows in those areas, use pen and paper to keep records, the number has to be read and recorded by a person and then entered into the electronic system.  EID systems are coming but the exact date is yet to be determined.  A backgrounder that I spoke to is looking forward to that day so they can keep their own records electronically based on the EID number.  They would apply an EID tag now of their own but they can not justify the cost when they only have the cows on farm for something around 100 days.

The tags are produced by Allflex and most often in the production facility in Vitre, about 2 hours west of Paris by train.  Orders are submitted each day by the regional department of agriculture (for French producers) and tags are custom made for each producer or as a replacement tag when one is lost.  The system is efficient and has many checks and balances in place to ensure accuracy and quality in the products.  I was fascinated to see how the tags are actually manufactured from start to finish under one roof and the speed at which production happens.    

Each time an animal is sold and therefore moved from one operation to another it is recorded in the national database, either through a paper based passport system as in the United Kingdom or electronically as in Ireland.  The processor in Northern Ireland that I visited tells me that data entry errors and tags being listed as what we would call retired are seldom and if they occur the information is verified and the problem corrected before the animal is allowed to be processed.  The information stays with the carcass as it did in Australia and each quarter is tagged with all the animal information including producer, breed and country of origin data.  

All meat sold in the stores is labelled with country of origin information on them.  It clearly states where the animal was born, raised and processed.  In France, all restaurants are now required to have written country of origin information on beef cuts available to patrons.  In the case of the restaurant at the hotel in Bourges where we stayed,  there was a notation on the menu that the information was available so I went to find it and had no trouble.  They had it on paper in a stand near the entrance.

Required French National ID tag and Charolais Herd Book tag
In France registered Charolais animals are also required to have a tissue sample taken and they use a method which leaves a green tag in their ear.  In Ireland, all national tags are tissue sampling tags and their goal is to have DNA tissue samples on all animals registered and commercial on file.

Example of Country of Origin information from restaurant 
Producers seem to accept the system as it is,  the level of regulation is so high that perhaps it is just one more piece to that puzzle.  Beef operations for the most part are smaller holdings, cattle are handled often and if not sold to the feeding industry in Italy then are kept at home and finished by the cow/calf producer themselves.  Reading tags by hand isn’t a hassle.  The data management system is government run in each country and the interface for the producer or processor is quick and easy to use.  


No system in perfect and no two system can be exactly the same.  There were many positive things that I have seen in the European traceability system.  The databases are extensive and it will be interesting to see how the industry can use that data to improve going forward.  Sharing of information is also a key piece of the traceability puzzle and will become more important as traceability expands into other aspects beyond the live animal to increase transparency, marketing opportunities and food safety.  Hans Johr from Nestle said it well on Sunday “We should all work together to ensure there are no more food scandals.” 

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Alltech Global 500 Beef & Dairy Conference, Deauville, France

When planning this trip to Europe as part of my Nuffield travels I actually built it around this conference being held in the Normandy region of France which brings together over 700 beef and dairy farmers from 42 countries.  My aim was to seek out new perspectives and to get a truly global perspective on beef production.  Conferences are efficient as they bring many people together in one location and I have an opportunity to talk to many of them, far more than I could if I was travelling around on my own.  As a company I wasn’t all that familiar with Alltech but I had heard about the conference a few years ago and caught part of it online last year so that was enough for me to make the trip and find out for myself.  Alltech is an American company based in Lexington, Kentucky that manufacturers and sells feed additives for ruminants.  They host this event annually and are present in countries around the world.  

The presentations were varied and included information on products available through Alltech and the technology behind them as well as outlooks and trends in a global context.  Surrounding the theme of “What if….” big questions were asked and the answers are complex and difficult but the discussion was good.  Labour shortages in agriculture, increasing efficiencies, traceability and sustainability were all topics covered during the two days.

Some interesting points I am taking home are:
  • Opportunities are often in worlds less travelled.
  • “You and I have a job thanks to consumers” Hans Johr, Nestle
  • It is always a good idea to invest in agriculture
  • Traceability will improve efficiency and innovation, decrease food waste and be necessary to sustain customer confidence.
For me the biggest feature was being in a group of farmers where I knew none of them.  Before leaving home, I expected to get here and run into someone I knew from home, the USA or by chance somewhere else but it did not happen.  It was refreshing.  I met many people from many countries, and met a few Canadians who live in the Calgary area as well.  

The town of Deauville, which hosted this event is beautiful.  The venue was right on the beach and the sun was shining.  The town had the old style wood buildings and is a popular vacation spot for well to do Parisians in the summer.  An American film festival is held every year in early September and the stars and stripes were already flying all around town.  


Over the past few days I have gathered plenty of material for my Nuffield project, gained knowledge and ideas that will be used at the office and had interesting conversations with a variety of people.  Another successful endeavour in my books. 

Monday, September 1, 2014

Beef Tour - Central Region of France


As part of the conference being held in France over Labour Day weekend they held a pre-conference beef tour, I decided to join so that I could see French beef operations and get a different view on things.  The tour started from Paris on Thursday noon and there were 13 of us plus a tour guide/translator and driver.  As a group we represented Australia, Croatia, India, USA and Canada; we had cow/calf producers, feedlot managers, nutritionists, veterinarians, breed association (me) and Alltech staff.  A true cross section of the beef industry around the world.

South from Paris we headed into the region where the Charolais breed originated.  Our headquarters would be the town of Borges about 2 hours directly south of Paris and our mission would be to visit three Charolais farms and attend the National Adult Charolais Show as part of the World Charolais Congress then make it up to Deauville for the start of the Alltech Global 500 Beef & Dairy Conference.  Challenge accepted and we thought we would add in a few additional fun things into the mix as well.  

Bailly Farm, first stop on the tour
The first operation we visited was a feedlot that fed Charolais cull cows for 60 days.  They purchased these cows from local auction markets, fed them for two months to add condition then shipped them off the processor.  It was a model than none of us on the tour had ever seen before but we found it interesting and since it was a 4th generation farm and there were three families living off of it there was obviously a market for this service and a reasonably large one at that.  
Our second stop the next day was a cow/calf operation (Charolais again) where we joined up with a tour group from the World Congress.  It was here that we began to realize just how big the cows were in France and a little about how cow/calf operations are run.  In this particular place they breed 75% of their 90 females by artificial insemination and they use 25 different bulls.  It has been a wet year in France and had rained the few days leading up to the tour so the cattle were all up close to the barn and we had a chance to see pretty much the entire herd.  There was greater uniformity than we had expected and were most surprised by the fact that they breed horned Charolais across France, although this operation was breeding some polled genetics into the herd.  

From there we headed to the National Adult Show where we had a magnificent lunch, after a day together we had gotten to know each other quite well and the conversation flowed almost as quickly as the Champagne.  The steak was delicious and I was quoted as saying “It was the best non-Angus steak, I’ve ever had”  Walking through the barns was the highlight for me.  I could write an entire post on my thoughts as to why the cattle are so big and how the traditions have been passed down from generation to generation very obviously in France and the pros and cons as I see it but I will only say that the “mountains of beef” that we saw were impressive.  The pictures hardly do the size and capacity of these animals justice.  I was also surprised to see the variety of Charolais branded beef products and even McDonald’s has a Charolais hamburger here.  My new American friends and I were nervous after seeing pasture and pasture of white cattle along the roads and in the farms we visited.  We asked one of the producers there why there are no other breeds present and he told us “black cattle will be shot in this region.”  Enough said.

Bulls at the National Charolais Show

Our final stop on the tour was a Co-operative Feedlot and Bull Test station.  Again, they work exclusively with Charolais.  Another interesting operation and the ideas of co-operatives of smaller scale farmers in Europe seems to be an opportunity from this outsider’s perspective.  


All in all the tour was fantastic, many hours on the bus but this provided plenty of time for discussion and  an opportunity to share experience and ideas from our respective countries with the group.  We arrived in Deauville in time for the Conference Welcome Reception and thus began the next phase of this weekend event.  A quick overview of a busy 48 hours but more posts to come.  Our two days was a success and it was an enjoyable trip and delivered on all the promises.  I am very glad I took the time to participate in it.