HALIFAX - Canadian farmers plan to lobby the federal government to implement a guaranteed annual income and a cap on the profits of the major grocery store chains in the country. 

The lobbying plans were adopted as a part of nine resolutions approved by members of the National Farmers Union who met at an annual conference in Moncton, N.B., last week.

A number of the farmers spoke at the conference about how it is becoming more difficult for them to conduct business in Canada every year. 

David Thompson, executive director of the union, says over the last two decades, profits for small and mid-scale farmers have sunk, costs for equipment and inputs have risen, and the price of land is now unattainable for many farmers. 

Rumours that farming equipment giant John Deere is leaving Canada spread this week on social media alongside a video claiming the company would be moving its factories to the United States. 

In fact, John Deere hasn't manufactured farm equipment in Canada since 2009 and the company says the claims in the video are false. The video comes from a YouTube channel that appears to use artificial intelligence to produce spam news content. 

THE CLAIM

"John Deere didn't quietly cut production. They packed up the future of Canadian manufacturing and moved it straight into the United States," said the narrator in a 17-minute-long video posted to YouTube, where it reached more than 200,000 views in two days.

Infectious disease veterinarian Scott Weese says the hundreds of ostriches shot dead on a rainy night at a British Columbia farm this month "probably weren't infected" with avian influenza at the time of the cull by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

The problem, says Weese, is that "we don't really know," and logistical challenges and conditions at the farm would have hindered rigorous testing of all of the birds.

The H5N1 avian flu virus — detected in the flock of more than 300 ostriches months earlier, prompting a battle by the farm to prevent the cull — cannot be controlled by hoping for the best, says Weese, a professor and infectious disease expert at the Ontario Veterinary College based at the University of Guelph.

"And that's what we would have been doing here."

The cull of hundreds of ostriches at a British Columbia farm is set to begin after the Supreme Court of Canada announced it would not be hearing an appeal by the farm's owners.

Here are five things to know about the situation at Universal Ostrich Farms in Edgewood, B.C.

1. The court fight

The Supreme Court of Canada on Thursday declined to grant the farmers leave to appeal their case again, after they previously lost bids to save the birds in Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal. Thursday's decision lifts a stay on the cull, meaning there's no legal barrier to the cull beginning immediately.

HALIFAX - This summer’s prolonged drought across Atlantic Canada has had a costly impact on wild blueberry growers in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

Donald Arseneault, general manager of the NB Blueberries industry group, says that as this year’s harvest was wrapping up, the total yield was believed to be 70 per cent less than the previous three-year average.

“This year has been tremendously dry and we haven't really seen this in a long time,” Arseneault said, adding that this year’s crop amounted to about 20 million pounds, down from the annual average of 68 million pounds.

The industry, which ships its product around the world, was also hurt by delays caused by the provincial government’s decision to temporarily shut down the harvest as it tried to deal with a growing number of wildfires that flared up amid tinder-dry conditions. 

A wall of hay bales about three metres tall has been constructed at a British Columbia farm where the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is organizing the cull and disposal of about 400 ostriches after an outbreak of avian flu in the herd. 

Several tractor-trailers loaded high with hay rolled onto Universal Ostrich farms on Tuesday, not long after the arrests of two key people in the movement to stop the animals from being killed.

Ostriches could be seen grazing beyond the wall, where four people wearing head-to-toe white protective suits were visible from the highway near the farm. 

Officials have not confirmed why the wall was installed or when the cull will happen.