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Mike von Massow

Sep 16, 2021
4 min

Food Prices - Long and Short Term Views

We are hearing a lot about food price inflation and the Statistics Canada food price index for August affirms that prices in August were up 2.7% year over year. This is significant and is likely to continue. The fact that overall inflation (4.1% in August relative to August 2020) is outpacing food price inflation suggests that there will more pressure overall on our pocketbooks going forward. Some of these food price increases look like they may be around for a while (and

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Will Your Steak or Burger Be a Victim of a Cyber Attack?

Mike von Massow

Jun 4, 2021
2 min

Will Your Steak or Burger Be a Victim of a Cyber Attack?

The news this week that JBS, one of the largest meat processors was hacked was being subject to a ransomware attack has generated many questions about both the availability and price of beef and pork. JBS is a big player in meat processing representing 25% of the US beef processing and 20% of US pork processing. JBS has a large beef plant in Alberta. The attack has closed many plants in the US, Canada, and Australia. It appears as though the issue has been brought under co

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Revisiting Canadian Beef Processing: Is Everything Back to Normal?

Mike von Massow

Dec 17, 2020
3 min

Revisiting Canadian Beef Processing: Is Everything Back to Normal?

Nicholas Bannon, Alfons Weersink, and Michael von Massow At the beginning of June, a Food Focus blog post spoke about the significant disruptions felt throughout the Canadian beef sector stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. The culprit was a widespread outbreak at Cargill’s High River, Alberta, facility which happens to be the largest beef processing plant in Canada. This outbreak saw a two-week period in April and May where the weekly number of cattle processed in Canadian f

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A Little Bit Sustainable? No! Fostering Progress.

Mike von Massow

Dec 12, 2020
2 min

A Little Bit Sustainable? No! Fostering Progress.

McDonalds launched their advertising campaign recently highlighting the introduction of beef certified under the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef's program. They don't provide much detail (a topic for another post I suppose) but they do suggest that 30% of their Quarter Pounders are now produced by certified producers. I've had several people highlight to me that this seems to be a bit of "green washing." I think its perfectly acceptable to make and announce a comm

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For Canadian Beef Processors, the Worst of COVID-19 Appears to be Over

Mike von Massow

Jun 11, 2020
5 min

For Canadian Beef Processors, the Worst of COVID-19 Appears to be Over

Written by Nicholas Bannon The COVID-19 pandemic caused major disruptions that have rippled through Canada’s beef sector, but it appears that a complete disaster scenario has been avoided, as the industry rebounds and beef production rises. This rebound follows the reopening of the Cargill meat processing plant in High River, Alberta, after a temporary closure of the plant due to a COVID-19 outbreak saw more than 900 employees become infected with the virus. When the Cargill

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An Integrated Beef Market Offers Protection from Plant Closures

Mike von Massow

May 11, 2020
4 min

An Integrated Beef Market Offers Protection from Plant Closures

Post by Brendan McDougall As scary as COVID-19 is, the potential for secondary consequences such as wide-scale food shortages are equally if not more terrifying. Throughout the pandemic, essential food workers have tirelessly fought to optimize supply chains, continue processing and keep grocery shelves stocked. COVID-19 outbreaks at two processing facilities in High River and Brooks Alberta and, more recently in Chambly, Quebec have brought on new conversations about the ava

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What's Happening with Food Service and Plant Based Meat?

Mike von Massow

Jan 9, 2020
3 min

What's Happening with Food Service and Plant Based Meat?

We're hearing a lot of commentary about the rise of plant based meat analogues in food service - particularly in quick service restaurants. It is clearly growing and we're seeing increased adoption with restaurants announcing new offerings. While it is difficult to know exactly what is happening in terms of growth, there are some signs that provide some insight into the market dynamics at play. McDonalds Canada just announced an expansion of their "experiment" with Beyond Mea

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Mike von Massow

Sep 26, 2019
3 min

Apocalypse Cow?

A recent report predicts that the North American beef and dairy cattle industry will be significantly disrupted by the development of cellular meat products. It states that the industry will be half its size and virtually bankrupt by 2030. Those are bold predictions. We rarely look back to see if predictions come true and my expectation is that to a significant degree, they are taking this provocative stance to push the discussion of the future of meat to the fore. It’s worth

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Banning beef at Goldsmiths University of London not a big deal

Mike von Massow

Aug 19, 2019
3 min

Banning beef at Goldsmiths University of London not a big deal

Goldsmiths University of London announced on August 12th that they would no longer serve beef in on-campus outlets as part of a larger plan to move towards carbon neutrality. This has gotten considerable attention across the globe with divergent views on whether this is a good thing or not. I am conscious of my emissions and I still eat beef. I like having access to lunches with beef on campus but its not a critical issue relative to my ability to discuss the merits of beef a

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China’s ban on Canadian meat imports could pummel our agri-food sector

Mike von Massow

Jul 2, 2019
4 min

China’s ban on Canadian meat imports could pummel our agri-food sector

This article was originally posted on theConversation.com and was written by Sylvanus Kwaku Afesorgbor, Brendan McDougall and Jiahao Zhu - all members of the Food, Agricultural and Resource Economics department at the University of Guelph. The China-Canada relationship has been deteriorating following the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, the Huawei chief financial officer. She faces possible extradition to the United States on charges of helping Iran evade American sanctions. Apart fr

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Nebraska floods may lead to an increase in beef price

Mike von Massow

Apr 8, 2019
2 min

Nebraska floods may lead to an increase in beef price

We pay a lot of attention to food prices. The reality is that food prices are increasing at a relatively steady rate over time. Increases in food prices matter, but they have tracked relatively closely to the overall rate of inflation for the past thirty years as can be seen from the graph below. There is actually much more price variability within years than there is between years. You can see in the second graph that there is considerable seasonal variation in price which r

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Mike von Massow

Apr 30, 2018
3 min

Less meat, more bugs in our food future

A piece that my colleague Al Weersink and I published in the Conversation on April 17th, 2018. Biologically speaking, humans are omnivores and we like to eat a variety of things. There is increasing interest in all sorts of alternative sources of protein as we diversify our diets. This trend is accelerating in 2018. According to Nielsen, the consumer analytics company, the proportion of Canadians identifying as vegetarian and vegan is still relatively small (six per cent and

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Mike von Massow

Jan 15, 2018
4 min

Meat tax will not significantly lower emissions and might just prevent reductions

This is a piece that I wrote with my colleague John Cranfield in the Conversation. Published on January 14th, 2018. Will taxing meat products based on their carbon footprint reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and improve public health? The answer is maybe, but not notably — and it will come with significant costs. A recent study in the journal Nature Climate Change advocates applying taxes to the consumption of meat as a means of lowering GHG emissions. The idea is that if

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RELATED PROJECTS

Considering the complexity of food, it is no surprise that conversations about it can be broad and diverse. In order to better understand how people think about food, Mike is involved in several projects. Learn more about each project below.

UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH SUSTAINABLE RESTAURANT PROJECT

Our team is a group of students, faculty and community partners that are committed to working towards a more sustainable future for the restaurant industry. Every year we hold a forum, bringing prominent speakers to the University of Guelph to discuss issues in the Canadian Restaurant Industry.

Learn More

foodFOCUS

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Keep up with the conversation here.

RELATED PROJECTS

Considering the complexity of food, it is no surprise that conversations about it can be broad and diverse. In order to better understand how people think about food, Mike is involved in several projects. Learn more about each project below.

UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH SUSTAINABLE RESTAURANT PROJECT