Thank you.
My name is Jake Ayre, and I'm a young farmer from Minto, Manitoba. Like many Canadians, my family and I immigrated to Canada in 2002 for a chance at a better life. I'm proud to come from a long lineage of farmers that dates back to the 1400s and traverses two continents. The Ayres have always been farmers, and agriculture has been the central tenet of our family's culture, heritage and way of life. Today, we continue the tradition of multi-generational farming with my mother, father and sister on our 1,900-acre farm and farm retail business.
On our farm, we produce and process pedigreed seed crops such as wheat, barley, oats and soybeans, as well as growing corn, canola and soybeans as cash crops. We also operate a farm retail business, Southern Seed Ltd., which sells pedigreed crops, inoculants and biologicals fertilizer, and cleans seeds with the option of optical sortation. I also crop 140 acres in my own name and am actively working on acquiring more land to grow our operation and business.
We are currently in the midst of succession planning. Both my father and I have taken an active interest in farm policy and have held various leadership roles, in addition to serving on boards and producer committees across our province.
Today I am speaking as an individual, and the opinions and thoughts expressed are my own.
I thank the standing committee for the opportunity to present today. I am pleased to see they're studying business risk management programs and have invited me to present. Now more than ever, the issue of business risk management is one that is very pertinent to agriculture and agri-food.