McDonald's® pilot establishes path for Canadian beef industry on journey to a verified sustainable beef supply

TORONTO, June 1, 2016 /CNW/ - McDonald's Canada announced the successful conclusion of its Verified Sustainable Beef Pilot today, an industry-first.  This marks a major milestone of its collaborative partnership with the Canadian beef industry over the past 30 months to advance more sustainable beef practices and supports the global company's broader aspirational goal to source all of its food and packaging sustainably.
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As one of the country's largest Canadian beef purchasers, McDonald's Canada, through the Pilot tracked the journey of nearly 9,000 head of Canadian cattle, or the equivalent of 2.4 million patties. The cattle spent their entire lives, from 'birth to burger', raised on or handled by verified sustainable operations.

See the full release here.

By Laura Kane , The Canadian Press — Jun 1 2016

McDonald's Canada has wrapped a pilot project to verify cattle ranches as producing sustainable beef, an initiative that one expert says could be a "gamechanger" for the industry.

The Canadian arm of the burger giant announced on Wednesday the results of a two-year partnership with the beef industry to advance environmental and ethical standards.
More than 180 beef operations in Canada were verified as sustainable after being assessed by a third-party auditor for principles including natural resources, animal welfare and community engagement.
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Jeffrey Fitzpatrick-Stilwell, senior manager of sustainability at McDonald's Canada, said consumers are increasingly interested in how their food is grown and raised.

Read the full article here.

McDonald’s Canada has wrapped a pilot project to verify cattle ranches as producing sustainable beef, an initiative that one expert says could be a “gamechanger” for the industry.

The Canadian arm of the burger giant announced on Wednesday the results of a two-year partnership with the beef industry to advance environmental and ethical standards.
More than 180 beef operations in Canada were verified as sustainable after being assessed by a third-party auditor for principles including natural resources, animal welfare and community engagement.
​
Jeffrey Fitzpatrick-Stilwell, senior manager of sustainability at McDonald’s Canada, said consumers are increasingly interested in how their food is grown and raised.

​Read the full story here.
Hear the interview here.

More than 180 beef operations in Canada were verified as sustainable under the pilot

McDonald's Canada has wrapped a pilot project to verify cattle ranches as producing sustainable beef, an initiative that one expert says could be a game-changer for the industry.
The Canadian arm of the burger giant announced today the results of a two-year partnership with the beef industry to advance environmental and ethical standards.

​Read the full article here.

Amanda Stephenson - June 1, 2016

The conclusion of a two-year pilot project by McDonald’s Canada aimed at sourcing “sustainable beef” for its restaurants, has the Canadian beef industry one step closer to a national verification system that could go a long way toward satisfying consumer demand to know more about the food they eat.
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​Read the full article here.

by Will Chabun

A veterinarian who’s also an epidemiologist and stock grower hopes the backlash to a restaurant chain’s decision to go out of Canada for beef supposedly raised in a “humane” way sends a lesson to that chain  and others.

Leigh Rosengren, who practises and farms near Midale, is also heartened by the willingness of Canadians to show, through social media and other means, support for the Canadian cattle industry.

That reflects the fact Canadians know we have “the safest food system in the world” and can “see through” claims that it isn’t.

The Earls restaurant chain triggered this controversy by announcing Tuesday it would become the first chain in North America to serve only “Certified Humane” beef — meaning beef raised without the use of antibiotics, steroids or added hormones, and slaughtered according to the specifications of animal welfare expert Dr. Temple Grandin.

​ Earls — which uses more than two million pounds of beef each year — claimed it was unable to find a Canadian supplier that could meet the chain’s demand for the product, though it said nothing about working with Canadian producers to do so. That means that beef served at Earls restaurants nationwide will no longer come from Canada, but from Kansas.
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This prompted Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall to tweet: “So @earlsrestaurant didn’t even consult with Canadian cattle producers before opting for US beef…”

Read the full article here.

Immediate release

Youth beef clubs awarded $9,750 in McDonald’s Video Contest

April 28, 2016 - Five Canadian youth beef clubs from across the country have shared their sustainable beef stories and won a total of $9,750 to support their clubs.

The contest engaged the next generation of Canadian beef producers at three levels:

1. Directly engaging them in a community workshop to share their definition of sustainable beef and why it is important to them and informing them about the McDonald’s Sustainable Beef pilot; Why it was undertaken and how it was conducted and hear what other ranchers in the community have learned through participation
2. The opportunity for their families to participate directly in the pilot itself.
3. Challenging them to produce a short video demonstrating why sustainable beef is important to their club members and how they make continuous improvement real on their ranch or feedlot.

The five winning clubs were selected by a panel of judges on three criteria: their ability to define why sustainable beef is important to their club members; their ability to bring continuous improvement in sustainable beef to life; and their ability to build connectivity between the beef community and consumers.

“We were thrilled to see the quality of entries and the effort these clubs took to share their passion for the beef industry with us,” said Jeff Fitzpatrick-Stillwell, Senior Manager, Sustainability with McDonald’s Canada. “Congratulations to all the winners for their hard work and their ongoing commitment to promoting sustainable beef in their communities – the future is in good hands.”

Prizes were awarded to the winning clubs:

• Excellence (First Place): Canadian Junior Angus Association/CJAA ($5,000)
• Achievement (Second Place): Longview 4H Beef Club ($2,500)
• Entry (Third, fourth and fifth place): Saskatchewan Junior Angus Association, Durness 4-H Beef Club and Holden 4-H Beef Club ($750/club)

According to Belinda Wagner, advisor with the CJAA, the group enjoyed the opportunity to interview members from across the country and find out what was important to their families in each diverse region of the country. 
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“The CJAA will be using the prize money to enhance programming at our two National events, Showdown 2016, the National Junior Angus Show to be held in Truro, Nova Scotia this summer, and GOAL 2017 which will be held in Edmonton, Alberta next February.  We hope to provide additional trucking assistance for animals to get to Showdown and for GOAL, our leadership conference, we hope to have a speaker(s) specific to continued sustainability in the beef industry,” said Wagner.

A preview of the winning entries was shared at the Alberta Farm Animal Care conference in Olds, AB on March 22. All the videos submitted can be found at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVP4ExYF4JaF_b_pIbnfZEw

For the latest news on the Sustainable Beef Pilot visit http://www.mcdvsb.com/news or follow us on twitter (@VSB_pilot) or on Facebook at McDonald’s Sustainable Beef Pilot Project.

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​For more information contact:
Matt Sutton-Vermeulen 515-371-7914

Canada leads the way in the search for more sustainable ways to produce beef
​Posted Apr. 7th, 2016 by Barbara Duckworth

OTTAWA — Canada is a star on the world stage when it comes to sustainability on the ranch, says Dennis Laycraft, the new chair of the Global Round Table on Sustainable Beef Production.


“I am pretty proud of the progress we have made in Canada,” he said at the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association annual meeting last month.

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Research has shown that the Canadian beef industry is leaving a small carbon hoof print. 

A recent study from Agriculture Canada and the University of Manitoba measured changes in greenhouse gas emissions of Canadian beef production from 1981-2011 and found a 15 percent improvement in 30 years. 


Read the full article here: Western Producer

March 30, 2016
By Alexis Kienlen  Reporter

Sharing data through the entire beef chain adds value that can translate to economic gains — although how much of that might go to cattle producers is a question yet to be answered.
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McDonald’s Canada, Beefbooster, and BIXSco — the company now running the Beef InfoXchange System — recently collaborated with Livestock Gentec to analyze two million records of carcass data. The analysis found calves sired by Beefbooster Terminal Cross bulls were worth $219 more than the average value of calves processed by packing plants from 2012 to 2014.

​The Calgary company has been using production data since 1970 to breed superior bulls, but this data gave it an exact dollar figure on the quality of carcasses of cattle sired by its bulls versus average cattle.

“We can take carcass information and say that there’s value between the different breeds and the different bulls,” said Jennifer Stewart-Smith, chief executive officer of Beefbooster.

Read the full article here.