There was an impressive showing by Canadian agricultural writers and photographers at the 2008 Star Prize awards handed out at the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists in Graz, Austria yesterday.
Continue reading Canada cleans up
| ||||||
 | Today, in Austria, we stepped off of our bus and into the middle of a postcard. High up in the mountains, the scenery fulfilled every stereotype I’ve ever had about this country. Cow bells could be heard in the distance. A babbling brook twisted alongside the roadway. Every home was a flower-laden chalet and, to the eye’s delight was mountain after mountain after mountain. I could have stayed there forever.
What made it even more unusual was that we were touring an average mountain beef farm. I’ve been to a lot of impressive beef farms in Ontario but none have the view of these, to be sure. Continue reading Beef farming in a postcard setting
The President of the Chamber of Agriculture and Forestry for Styria (one of Austria’s nine provinces), Gerhard Wlodkowski, talked to us about his organization’s activities last night – and chief among them was raising public awareness about how food is produced.
The International Federation of Agricultural Journalists (IFAJ) is a non-political, professional association for agricultural journalists in 29 countries. Continue reading From Austria to Australia; IFAJ delegates come together
Several farmers and farm managers that we’ve met on our journey so far have talked to us about a general decrease in agriculture in Slovakia since 1989. Much of that has to do with strengthening efficiencies, boosting production and evolving to a free market system from the old style of collective farming run by the state. When I was planning my visit to Europe, I mistakenly anticipated the fact that I’d understand very little of the language. I’ve been taking French lessons for years, so hoped that I’d comprehend at least a little of the language in Paris. I’m also travelling with my friend Lilian who is fluent in German so I had jokingly told friends I was taking my own personal translator to Austria. Continue reading English – and music – are the common denominators
|   | ||||
Copyright © 2012 Food and Farming Canada - All Rights Reserved | ||||||
It was an all-too-familiar tune and one that most in the international audience could strongly relate to.
Earth, nutrients and water are the fundamentals of growing food. But today I had the chance to experience these fundamentals from an entirely different perspective – a mud bath and healing waters in a Slovak health spa.