I am one of the westerners in the crowd. I was born and raised in Manitoba on a beef, cereal grain, and oilseed farm. I graduated from the University of Manitoba with a degree in agriculture economics and did some graduate work at the University of Guelph, so I could split my experience between one end of the country and the other.
My best piece of advice for the next-generation farmer is to think ahead and build a strong business plan. My reason for that is fairly clear: plans do not always come to fruition, but the people who plan are closer to their goals than people who don't. So I think you have to keep doing that.
The specific thing we are doing at Scotiabank for young farmers is that we have dedicated farm teams from the field level, whether in the local branch for the small business farmers, or commercial credit client relationship managers, or the credit people who adjudicate credit in face-to-face contacts with farmers, up to the policy-making level of the bank. At all of these levels, we have people involved who are trained and specialized in agriculture. We do that because we want to help the industry grow.