Meet the team: Jennifer Brunette, manager of events and member services

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For any industry association, getting its members together in one place can be a monumental task. Here at ACFA that task falls to Jennifer Brunette, our manager of events and member services. This week on our meet the team series, we’re going to get to know a little about Jennifer and her work.

Before joining ACFA, Jennifer studied event management and public relations at Mount Royal University, and her training has stood her in good stead. She plays an instrumental role in ACFA’s day-to-day operations, as well coordinating events such as Big on Beef, our annual golf tournament, and – most importantly – the Alberta Beef Industry Conference.

The conference is hosted in conjunction with the Alberta Beef Producers, the Alberta Livestock Dealers and Order Buyers Association, the Alberta Auction Markets Association and the Western Stock Growers Association, and Jennifer does a great job of pulling together an event that unites beef producers, processors and suppliers from Alberta and around the world.

“I love dealing with our suppliers and producers,” said Jennifer. “I get to work with such a diverse group of people, and reach out to a lot of industry stakeholders. I take a great deal of pride in making sure that we showcase our sponsors and participants at the highest level possible.”

img_0359Jennifer grew up around ranch operations and feedlots, and yet her journey to this industry was not a direct one. As a teenager in Oliver, B.C., she went from high school into a position with a local credit union. Her career was going well, and she didn’t anticipate any reason to change.

But then Jennifer had an accident that put a wrench in her plans. After being involved in a pedestrian/motor vehicle accident, she was told that she might never walk again, and so began seven years of intensive therapy and the greatest challenge of her life.

“I was 21 when it happened, and that accident took a chunk of my youth,” said Jennifer. “I persevered through years of intensive therapy. Regaining the ability to walk on my own two feet has been one of the biggest achievements of my life. It has also given me the ability to approach life with passion and determination; I no longer take the simplest things for granted.”

Now Jennifer lives in Calgary with her husband and her two boys, aged three and six.

We asked Jennifer for one final word about her work with cattle feeders and the association – “Everyone who works in this industry is very passionate and driven to move the industry forward in a positive light. Our members and board are such an amazing group of people. I have great respect and admiration for the work they do, not only for the industry but on their own operations as well,” she said.

Check out these other posts in our meet the team series, in which we introduce Bryan Walton, CEO, Page Stuart, past board chair, Martin Zuidhof, board chair, and Casey Vander Ploeg, manager of policy and research.

Why farm safety starts with people

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Farm safety is a hot topic, and one that’s highly personal for many people in this industry.

As we discussed in ‘How the agriculture sector is pulling together to promote farm safety’, farm safety is unique in many ways. For instance, in no other industry do operators typically live and raise their families in the same place where they work. And in many instances, their employees are their family, friends and neighbours.

And yet, farming is one of the highest risk occupations in Canada. According to Alberta Agriculture, Food and Rural Development, there were an average of 17 farm-related deaths per year, between 1985 and 2010.

To put that number in perspective, it’s worth noting two things:

    1. Farm injury statistics do not differentiate between work related injuries on farms, and non-work related injuries.
    2. Because agriculture plays such a large role in Alberta’s economy and there are so many farms, the ratio of fatalities to the number of farms is one of the lowest rates of any province in Canada.

Is legislation the answer?

In Alberta, agriculture was exempt from provincial Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) legislation, but Bill 6 has changed that. OHS now applies to agriculture in Alberta. But there is dispute as to whether simply passing such legislation is really effective in reducing farm injuries. In provinces such as B.C., which included agriculture in OHS legislation in 2005, and Ontario, which did the same in 2006, there has been no significant impact.

In fact, in 2013, 42 per cent of Canada’s farm fatalities were in Ontario, on just 25 per cent of the nation’s farms.

Creating a culture of safety

If legislation has not proven to be the answer, then perhaps the solution must come from within the industry itself. We believe that reducing on-farm injuries and fatalities depends on creating a culture of safety that is built collaboratively by everyone involved in the industry.

This view is supported by recommendations made to the Minister of Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development (PDF), by the Farm Safety Advisory Council in 2012. They advocated the establishment of a province-wide coordinating body to provide leadership, expertise and direction for farm safety awareness, education, training and certification.

Among their recommendations were an increase in educational resources, training and certification, as well as industry best practices, and government guidelines and policies.

What is safety culture?

Just as corporate culture can be defined by the values, beliefs and attitudes of people within an organization, so safety culture is characterized by the pervading behaviours and attitudes towards safety.

When organizations start to value safety as a practice, and to develop the practices and protocols in support of safe behaviours, then everyone within that organization is safer.

Some recent or ongoing farm safety initiatives with which the Alberta Cattle Feeders’ Association has been involved include:

For more information, check out the Farm Safety Advisory Council’s Recommendations to the Minister of Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development, on Enhanced Farm Safety Education and Training.

Stay tuned as we continue to explore farm safety issues in upcoming blog posts. In the meantime, you can read our previous posts on the topic: ‘How safe is farm equipment’, and ‘How the agriculture sector is pulling together to promote farm safety’.

How safe is farm equipment?

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Statistics show us that agriculture is one of the most hazardous industries in Canada. But statistics don’t always tell the whole story. As we learned in ‘How the agriculture sector is pulling together to promote farm safety’, it’s hard to compare farming to other industries, because so many people live where they work. Without data that separates work-related incidents from non-work related incidents that happen on farms, the statistics are very hard to interpret.

One thing that’s certain, though, is that farm equipment is a major cause of injuries. According to Glen Blahey, agricultural health and safety specialist at the Canadian Agricultural Safety Association, “machinery is one of the predominant causes of injury simply because of the frequency of use. After machinery, it tends to be livestock and then slips, trips and falls.”

What is being done about equipment injuries?

First and foremost, equipment manufacturers have taken great strides in making equipment safer to operate. “Equipment design has improved very significantly over the years,” said Glen, “and the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) has a technical committee that looks specifically at agricultural machinery. They look at it from a design perspective, in terms of how to keep that equipment as functional as possible and yet as safe as possible.”

The missing piece, in many instances, is the ability of the end user to operate that machinery effectively.

“It’s not necessarily that the equipment is dangerous or has unsafe features in it,” Glen explained, “but rather that there is operator error or a lack of adequate training. There may even be a lack of adequate protocol practices that are set out to the people who are going to be operating the equipment.”

Training and awareness is improving due to the availability of training, both online and in person. But when it comes to enforcing those protocols, that’s where farm operators and owners have to truly step up.

“I believe that there is a growing awareness and understanding in regards to overall safety and health and wellbeing,” concluded Glen. “The next generation of farmers coming up is more conscious of environmental issues, and more conscious of what people think of the agriculture industry. Additionally they have a higher awareness of the implications of an injury and of sustaining permanent disability injuries.”

There’s still a great deal of progress to be made, but Canada’s beef industry, and farmers everywhere are committed to continued improvement. Representatives are currently participating in consultation sessions regarding the Enhanced Protection for Farm and Ranch Workers Act (Bill 6).

You can read more about farm safety in our Farm Safety Policy Statement, and in ‘How the agriculture industry is pulling together to promote farm safety’.

How people in 58 countries enjoy Canadian beef

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In an earlier post on this blog we explored the contribution Alberta’s beef industry makes to our province’s economy. We explained that exports make up an important part of that contribution, because we produce more beef than Canadians eat.

To learn more about beef exports, and where they go, we spoke with Rob Meijer, former president of Canada Beef. “Many agricultural commodities, like beef cattle, have a high dependence on exports,” said Rob, “and every year, Canada exports approximately 45 per cent of its beef production.”

Canada’s main beef export marketsCanadian Beef Exports 2015

Canadian beef is shipped to 58 countries, but 71 per cent goes to the United States. China, Mexico, Japan and Hong Kong together represent another 24 per cent (source: Canadian Cattlemen’s Association).

Market growth

The good news for Canadian beef producers, and for the economy, is that the first half of 2016 saw an 11 per cent increase in exports, by volume. “These increasing export volumes have been supported by larger domestic beef production which is up nine per cent so far this year,” said Rob.

“While new markets do occasionally open to Canadian beef,” he continued, “what is often more significant to the industry is the expansion or liberalization of trade with existing markets. For example, on June 28th of this year, Mexico announced that, effective October 1st, the full range of Canadian beef products will be eligible for import. Then, on July 8th, Taiwan reopened its borders to boneless and bone-in beef from cattle under 30 months of age.”

Both Mexico and Taiwan had previously banned imports of Canadian cattle and beef, after the 2003 outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). The resumption of trade is a testament to the fact that the Canadian beef industry produces safe, high quality beef.

Why beef exports matter

Rob explained that exports allow producers to add value to their products by giving them access to customers who use different parts of the carcass than Canadian customers do. “In fact, over the last 10 years, export markets have added an average of $510 per head of additional value,” he said.

For an industry that contributes $33 billion worth of sales of goods and services, either directly or indirectly, to the Canadian economy, it’s clear that exports represent a valuable part of the business. And of course exports allow millions of people across the world to enjoy our beautiful Alberta beef!

QUIZ: How well do you know your beef?

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You probably know that Alberta is the hub of Canada’s beef industry. And that feedlots play a huge role in the production chain. But what don’t you know? Take our quiz and find out just how much you do know about the business of cattle feeding:

How did you do? Remember, you can find the answers to all these questions in our other blog posts. A great place to start is ‘Feedlots 101: everything you need to know about cattle feeding in Alberta’.