TAPE #446 - Women, Business and Agriculture

Tape #446 - Women, Business and Agriculture

I think we should get started. Thank you for coming. We were waiting here for our moderator and no one has come so think we will just start it off ourselves. Because I'm sure you -- it's been a long day already and folks are looking forward to closing the sessions and getting a few minutes to relax before the banquet. My name is Gloria Preezann, I'm with Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food from Saskatchewan Canada and I'm here sharing the podium here today. I'll be giving the first presentation on Saskatchewan women in business and agriculture and Lola Marino will be here also giving presentation after my presentation. She will be presenting in Spanish so if you don't or didn't pick up your translating packages, you might want to do that.

Before I begin I'd like to introduce my colleague Ms. Terry Grachuck who is sitting over there going to give me a hand [laughter] with the slide projector and I'm wandering how many other people do we have in the audience from Saskatchewan. We have a couple here. Good and how about Canada? All right. Happy Canada day. So when we get to the question and answer period, if we run into some questions that are beyond the things that I'm not knowledgeable in, then any of the rest of you from up north can help feel the questions to or offer additional support to the answers that I might have.

What are the main issues that rural Saskatchewan women are facing as they want to embark on their on business enterprise? How do they overcome those obstacles? In the next half hour I will answer these two questions.

I'll begin by giving a brief overview of our Providence. So you can put the information into some context that will be more useful for you. I'll then briefly describe some survey results wherein rural western Canadian women were asked to identify what their main obstacles were and then we will have closer look at four individual rural women from our Providence and the businesses that they have embarked on and how they have overcome their particular circumstances. I selected women from various parts of the Providence who are doing different types of businesses to try and give you an idea of the diversity of activity that we have in our Providence. If I could have the slide projector please and the lights. How is the focus? Is that all right? There we can both see a little bit. I still have a bit of a crutch here in my paper so --

As you can see Saskatchewan is located in the western part of Canada. Canada is the brown shaded area. You can see where we are from Washington where we are all here today.

Saskatchewan is known as one of our three prairie Providences of the country. Located between Alberta to the west and Manitoba to the east. And it gets that name from the broad sweeping prairies of the southern part of the Providence and the transcanada highway passes through that area. So often people who travel that road have the idea that that is all that Saskatchewan is and it is prairie, but it's a lot of other things as well. Saskatchewan is about a quarter million square miles in size, which is roughly the size of Germany and Poland combined. We have a population of about one million people which has been at that level or roughly that level since about 1931. The northern area of Saskatchewan which is shaded dark green is known as our Providential forest and population in that area is very sparse and the southern half of the Providence is what we call our agricultural region where most of the people reside.

Regina our capital city and Saskatoon which is a couple hours north of there. Our larger cities with population of about 200,000 people and we have numerous others cities, towns, villages and hamlets scattered throughout the agricultural region. A little more than half of our population lives in urban centers and a little less than half live in the country. We have, as you can see from the larger maps there we are quite a distance from our seaports, so we have some transportation issues that we have to face when we are looking at exporting. Exporting is one of our main sources of productivity or income. Grain, agricultural products including grain, cattle and many other products is really what we consider the backbone of our economy. Although we do have very viable forestry, oil and gas, part [inaudible] industries as well. The sparse population is very widely distributed throughout the southern half of the Providence, but it's very thinly distributed. So we have one of the highest number of miles of road per person in the world.

The relatively dry conditions of the southern part of the Providence, the thin soils and warm climate lead to the broad sweeping grassy landscapes of the deep southwest which is ideal for cattle ranching. A little farther north, most your conditions increase and we see the transition into deeper soils making the land suitable for crop production and more intensive operations. This slide is a little dark it does show some of our market gardens in the Copel Valley and dairy. Still farther north colder climates and increased moisture brings the transition to forest, lakes, mudskids and boggs. Temperatures vary greatly throughout the year. Our summer days of 30 degrees Celsius so in the 90's would not be uncommon as would winter days of minus 40 and minus 40 is minus 40. It doesn't matter if you are talking Fahrenheit or Celsius. It's cold anyway you look at it. These seasonal extremes in temperature and regional variations in moisture conditions dictate the variety of agricultural activities that can be undertaken successfully. The vast area limited population and distance to market and high transportation cost offer unique challenges. With the recent lost of the grain subsidy grain shipping subsidy many farmers are facing serious financial pressures. The Providential Department of Agriculture and Food encourages producers to focus on diversification and value added processing to increase the value of the products that are being exported from the Providence and to capture these markets.

There are recorded about 50,000 farming operations in our Providence. 42,000 are reported to be operated by men, 12,000 farms are reported to be run by men and women and 2,000 farming operations are reported to be run by women alone. Although I suspect that the numbers in the category that describe men and women as the farm operators, its probably low because we still have a tendency in some cases for women not to acknowledge that they are farming operator when in fact they do participate in the farming activities as do their husbands. Now the survey that I had referred to was a survey that was completed by the Western Economic Diversification of Canada. Is that out of focus? And women were through the survey were asked to identify the key barriers that they had experienced as they tried to enter and compete in business. And as you read through this list you will see that there's really nothing new here from what you probably heard several times throughout the conference. And I don't think we should take this to mean gee we've heard all this before so much as my goodness these issues truly are universal.

External barriers were identified as attitudes and perception of others as to what a woman's role should be. Sometimes they felt that other people really didn't support them in some of their ventures because they thought that it really wasn't a woman's place to participate in certain activities or they didn't accept her as an equal in those activities.

Internal barriers were when women often said that they were perhaps their own worst enemy, having no confidence in themselves or feeling that they weren't suppose to be in certain areas themselves or that they really didn't know if they knew enough about a certain area to enter into it.

Limited access to capital which we've heard a lot about in this conference relates of course to perceived lack of credibility by some financing institutions. Perhaps lack of experience in negotiating loans or the size and type of business that the woman was trying to establish.

Education and training was also a key issue for many people. Sometimes they lacked managerial experience or they had limited knowledge in the sector that they wanted to enter. They often had limited relevant education and training to assist them in their task. So it's not to say that the women were necessarily not educated but not necessarily educated in the particular field that they had chosen to start their new business in.

Limited access to information and networks refers to the lack of peer support networks. Lack of mentors or contacts within their business areas. And, of course, family responsibilities. Although things are changing in Saskatchewan and across Canada women still do bare the primary responsibility for child rearing and family and home care responsibilities.

The first woman that I would like to talk to you is Mrs. Marian Russell who operates the Russell's Alpaca Ranch. Marian started thinking about going into her own business about four years ago when her youngest child was ready to start kindergarten. I asked her what attracted her to this particular enterprise because there aren't a lot of Alpaca farms in Saskatchewan, although it one of those new and growing industries. She said that she had looked at many options before she decided on Alpacas. The things that she considered were the fact that she like working with animals. She needed something that she could operate on her own as her husband was away a fair amount of time and she thought this was the type of stock she could handle herself physically.

Many years ago she had raised pure bred quarter horses so she was comfortable with things such as breeding program for quality stock. Her biggest obstacle was financial. She and her husband had to put up everything they owned for collateral. The stock that they purchased was every expensive and she had researched blood lines to select particular animals that she wanted and although they weren't the very very highest grade of animal, they still were good stock that she wanted so she paid very good price for them.

She was able to persevere and get started because she felt that facilities that she required were very minimal. She already owned seven acres of land and the page wire and the posts and the facilities didn't need to be heated in the winter because the Alpacas are very hardy animals. They come from climates where they spend a vast majority of their days in below freezing conditions. So while we think our winters are long and cold, I guess this is actually the banana belt for the alpacas. So they were quite comfortable. Marian does not feel that she experienced the same difficulties as younger entrepreneur do because of her age and experience and her confidence, she said she just doesn't accept some of the stuff anymore that sometimes that the younger people do. She just goes right ahead and does what she thinks is right and doesn't listen to any negative comments.

Marian currently have five females and she will have five babies out this stock and she will sell four out of the five to make the payment on her investment and the baby that she retains will be left to add to her stock. But this is not her main source of income. Her value added is what keeps her enterprise alive. This poor little thing here, it's been shaved from the ears down to leave the beautiful hair that Marian has hired local knitters to knit into wonderful sweaters. Marian designs the patterns, fill the orders, attend trade shows and markets her sweaters and does her knit products as her main ongoing income.

The key factors to her success were her attention to herd health. She was very knowledgeable veterinarian and access to veterinary college at the University of Saskatchewan which is [inaudible]. She pays particular attention to the breeding program and to produce the softest, densest fiber and is very strict about her nutrition program for her animals. Doing her homework ahead of time, researching the business, the animals and the markets and selecting an enterprise that was suited to her skills, her interest and her personal lifestyle were seen as the critical factors for her being able to maintain the operation.

Betty Outhouse, Dr. Betty Outhouse is the second woman I'd like to talk about. Betty was raised on a farm and became a Veterinarian. She practices a Veterinarian for eight years and then she started a family and she found that the 60 to 80 hour work week really wasn't conductive to family lifestyle. Betty had focused her Veterinary practice on swine herd health and had lots of international exposure to hogs, barns and management techniques and this was why she took a particular interest in starting her own hog operation and she started with a 200 sow hog facility.

Betty also had a keen interest in animal welfare so she wanted to structure her operation with more animal friendly conditions inside her barn which generally translates into larger space per animal and straw bedding on all of the floors. So her main obstacle was lack of western Canadian expertise in straw bedded solid manure systems. Also Betty had trouble obtaining loans from financial institutions and without any land as collateral. She only had a small acreage and even the facility when built is considered to have no value because an intensive hog operation you can't count on being on anyone being willing to purchase that so you have no collateral even after you have built and paid for your operation.

The equipment sales people did not take her seriously and not knowing a lot of the mechanical, electrical construction terms to counter what she felt very much at a disadvantage. She overcame her obstacles by maintaining contacts outside of the country regarding the waste disposal systems and her husband was an agricultural engineer so between she and him they developed their own sewage disposal system to accommodate the straw bedding manure.

She did many hours of negotiating. Her in-laws finally provided her with their land and their feed company as extra collateral as security to provide the final funds that she needed. And she did end up using her husband as the middle man for equipment sales until they got to know that she was serious and then they were willing to talk to her.

Although she's been in operation for ten years, Betty still doesn't, she's still very modest about declaring herself a success. Betty's market is somewhat different from some of the other women that I'm profiling today. Her sale system is in place. She just needs to deliver her hogs through SPI, Sow, Pork International and she receives a price as they are delivered. She also supplies the local meat retailer and butcher and receives a premium price for her hogs. But she doesn't have to spend too much time worrying about finding markets or developing her own markets. Right now she thinks she's suffering as many difficulties as she did when she set up because her facility is now ten years old. Maintenance requirements are creeping up. Things are starting to wear out and she does not have plumbing or electrical or mechanical or welding experience. Her husband has his own job off the farm and is away a fair amount of time. So she finds it hard to find help at a reasonable cost.

She took a great professional risk leaving a professional position where she was doing very well for herself. And went into a self-employment which is a much riskier business. And she did invest in a business that had practically no resale value. So she is in it for the long haul. She's said that now after ten years of work, 365 days a year, it would be nice to have an occasional day off. But it's also difficult with such a small operation to find relief workers. She thinks it would be easier if she had a larger land base and more things for someone to do to find relief help. But she still says she values her operation very much, she does not regret going into it because it gives her the flexibility that she needed for her family priorities pleasant working conditions and environment and good income potential. And this is an inside shot of Betty's operation. And that's Betty.

Delea Grant operates the Home Quarter Game Farm Ranch which is a fallow deer operation. Delea was raised on a farm, but has lived the last twenty-five years in the city working for the Federal government as a civil servant in Revenue Canada and she married a city boy which didn't make it any easier to move to the farm . From my perspective I also married a city boy and know it would be a pretty big step to move into farming operation when your spouse wasn't familiar with that lifestyle or that work. But she wanted to return home back to the farm. Her enterprise started about five years ago when she purchased a quarter of land and a farmhouse about a half hour out of Regina. She has a herd about a 140 head of fallow deer.

What attracted her to this business? She looked at many different kinds of animals. Researching their requirements and markets for their products. She decided on fallow deer because they were well adapted to our climate. They did not need vast acreage so they can accommodate them on her land base with area left over to grow hay crops. And they don't require special rations, mixes or pellets. And she felt she could handle the animals physically because they're quite small and she said she simply fell in love with them the first time she saw them.

Her facilities consist of pen areas that she can move the animals between. Squeeze chute, I'm sorry, An alley way - A closed in alley way up to the barn and a simple squeeze chute inside the barn where she can administer veterinary shots or whatever else animal care that she needs to administer.

Her biggest obstacles were government regulations and red tape as she says to get her deer that she purchased from British Columbia which is two Providences west of us. She had very limited information on animal husbandry. Limited veterinary support knowledge and she says through her research she often provides information to her veterinarian on things that she has found out that is still quite unknown in our part of the country. She had no established market. She needed to create her own which is unlike Betty, Delea can't just load up her animals and take them to market and sell them. There are no slaughter facilities in Saskatchewan that would allow her to sell her meat outside of the Providence. She indicates that there is a big demand in Alberta and there's been request from Korea but she is not able to even consider those markets for the future, because we don't have the facilities just yet that would allow her to meet export standards.

And finally she had no association to work with when she started. So she actually started her the first association for fallow deer or was one of the founding members. Although she said that at the first few meetings they did expect her to be the secretary and make the coffee, but as time progressed they realized that she knew a couple of things or least as much as they did and it has worked better since then.

Delea's main markets. Delea makes her income from a variety of value added activities associated with the deer. Delea sews herself. She designs and sells many many leather products including jackets, purses, mitts, slippers, you name it. She has harvested the velvets from the antlers of some of the bucks, but she has not found this an easy thing to do in terms of selling the velvet because her experience so far has been that the people who buy the velvet will offer her a certain price and then when she has the velvet they're saying well the antler was too long and then if she cuts it longer the antler was too short and she just found that in the end she cannot rely on the price that people have negotiated with her. Always saying that she didn't do it just the way they wanted so right now she is forgoing that because it's not worth her while. She said its just too much hassle.

Still her main product is the meat. She had to create her own market by attending farmers markets, fairs and shows on a regular basis and get her product known and accessible to the public. On this first table here, this is downtown Regina we have farmers markets on Saturday afternoons and you can see her handmade products on the table and at the end of the table there's a small deep freeze which she and her husband load up in the back of the half ton every Saturday morning, take it into the city and stand there and sell their products to people right in town. And there's actually quite a good market right in town and tourist market as well. She sells to whole sellers and supplies some meat for special banquets. Right now she's finding that local markets do take all her meat and she does not have the stock at present time to meet some of the outside markets that she knows are waiting out there to be filled.

Delea would like to see her operation grow from 100 doe to 200 doe and she would still like to keep the operation at the size that she could handle herself. And that time she feels her income would be high enough that she'd be in a position to quit her job in the city and devote full-time to her fallow deer operation.

Bep Hammer or Grandma Bep is value added processor from the southwest of our Providence. She's a master baker by profession and originally had no intention of diversifying into value added processing until she was approached by the Department of Agriculture and Food. She was asked if she would participate in an initiative to test markets for products that were developed in Saskatchewan from Saskatchewan products. That was ten years ago and she hasn't looked back. Bep now produces 42 different products. Some of which are on display on the table at the side. These include jams, teas, soup mixes, salad dressings, chutneys, pies and many many more items. 95% of the input that she puts into her products are grown in Saskatchewan.

Her biggest problem in the development of the value added business was marketing and sales. And again she had to do it herself by attending trade shows and gift shows. She found bankers did not want to lend her the money and she was required to have her husband to co-sign the loan and put up their land for collateral. She also had limited knowledge of the processing industry and limited access to information. And she obtained most of her information through the university.

When she first started on this project with AG and Food, there were eleven processors who set up a network which she said did offer some support in the beginning, but has felt that in fact the network is not functioning very well at present time because of the competitive nature of the business. She has found that people in the network now don't want to loan their edge by giving away marketing ideas or they're treasured recipes for their favored product. So she is finding that the network is declining in its usefulness.

Bep's products are sold mostly in western Canada and in specialty food stores, flower shops and tourist shops. I did ask her about using the major chain stores or the grocery stores and if you were here at the presentation that just preceded me, you would have learned about the slot prices or the extra charges that the chain stores often charge to just have your product on the shelf. So she said she just couldn't afford to put it through those markets.

Bep attended 24 trade shows last year which she says is now starting to feel like 24 too many. Last year she and her husband purchased an older motel on the outskirts of nearby Swift Current which is a small city in the heart of Cowboy country. They live in the facility and have all of their processing done in the same building. Their plan is to develop the site as a tourist stop with distinct western flavor. They have a bar-be-que pit out back. Her husband writes and reads cowboy poetry, plays guitar and there are antiques to view in a tea room where you can indulge in some of the fine fair that she has.

In summary we've seen that Saskatchewan has a unique situation in many respects to climate, population, transportation and the economic. We've seen the most common obstacles that are faced by rural women entering business and how some of these were also encountered by the four women we looked at today and how they have overcome those obstacles and developed their own thriving and successful businesses.

Diversification and value added processing are seen as key strategies to Saskatchewan's future. But the common thread we see through these very successful women's stories is researching the enterprise before they started, the very hard work and persistence that they put in for several years before they started to show a profit and as we also heard several times in the conference the marketing and the fact that you have to be out there every day, every week having people see you. You have to be visible and you have to tell them why you have something that they would enjoy owning. Success don't come overnight nor does it come without risk.

Women entrepreneurs are the new pioneers of the new millennium. Are there any questions?

[Applause]

We have a mike in the middle of the floor and the recording session would like everyone to speak into the mike please. Is it on? I'm sorry I can't hear you.

I don't think it's going to work. I'll bring the mike down.

My question is how much is an alpaca in Canada?

I think the value varies a great deal depending on the quality and Terry you may be know better than I do. I think the animals that Marian Russell brought were Terry is indicating $30,000 an animal. I think she said she paid about $25,000 to $30,000 for one animal. And she said you can get them cheaper if you want to go get them yourself. If you go to one of the countries where Alpacas are raised or live naturally, but you can probably buy them originally for about $500 but its a tremendous effort to get them through quarantine systems, etc. And she decided she wanted to get animals that were already here and already had established bloodline, so she went with the product that she knew exactly what she had. Terry did you have anything to add?

Is that Canadian dollars?

Yes, that's Canadian dollars so I think that's quite close to Australian dollars, but a fraction of U.S. dollars.

What's the ratio?

The exchange rate we paid was about $l.48 for one US dollar.

I have a question. Have the Saskatchewan women attempted a common credit union?

I'm not aware of one. Terry do you know if there a common credit union. Perhaps in the interest of time I'll pass the microphone over to our next presenter and actually I should do one more thing. I see that our folders are gone at the back. I have a few pens here if there's anybody that didn't get a folder. I'll leave pens at the back table and secondly do we have any women here that are into say jams and jelly productions, those types of things? No one. There are about eight little items there on the table, I guess the first eight people that pass by there can help themselves to one of the items and I will also leave the pens there if you didn't get a package that had a pen in and help yourself to a pen as well. Thank you.

[Applause]

Presenter is speaking Spanish - unable to translate. END OF SIDE 1 OF TAPE

SIDE TWO OF TAPE - speaker speaking Spanish - unable to translate

[Applause]

Do you have any questions?

Do women, are they able to own land in Spain? Or is it in the husband's name?

How about if I put the question back through the mike and the translator can repeat it? The question was are women allowed to own land in Spain?

Are our translators still there?

The question was are women in Spain allowed to own land?

[Answer is in Spanish]

I just like to ask the question about where the funding comes for your organization. Whether you get some money from the government or whether you raise the money yourselves for your work?

[Answer in Spanish]