(Alice McFarlane/farmnewsNOW Staff)

By Alice McFarlane

Agriculture Roundup

Agriculture Roundup for Tuesday April 14, 2020

Apr 14, 2020 | 8:54 AM

Cattle feedlots are facing challenges with news Cargill is moving to a single shift at its High River, Alta. facility.

The plant is one of the two major beef processors in western Canada and employs roughly 2,000 people.

Slaughter capacity will fall to about 1,500 head per day, which is less than half of production.

The union representing employees wanted Cargill to close the plant for a couple of weeks after dozens of positive COVID-19 cases.

The pandemic has caused havoc at several processing facilities in Canada and the United States.

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The Smithfield Foods pork processing plant in Sioux Falls will close for two weeks after nearly 300 positive COVID-19 cases among its 3,700 employees.

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The ministry of agriculture is adopting a permission-based survey system.

It means farmers must give prior approval for staff to come onto their land to do the surveys.

The information gathered from the surveys are used in developing pest and insect forecast maps for everything from diamondback, aster yellows and leafhoppers to field pea, cereal, canola and flax diseases.

The ministry said they always follow strict biosecurity protocols before entering any field.

Producers willing to participate in the survey process should contact their local regional office of the Ag Knowledge Centre.

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alice.mcfarlane@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @AliceMcF