By Blake Kibbe
The Haldimand Press
DUNNVILLE—Guelph University’s Farming Foundations and Agricultural Management is a free certificate program that began this past January. The program is being offered four times a year and is funded by a three-year $1.5 million donation from the RBC Foundation with the support of Farm Credit Canada.
Once enrolled, students work through eight modules on a variety of topics.
“We learn basics of business planning, finance, human resources, risk management, farm family transitions, and farmer mental health and resilience,” says Charlotte Huitema, Secretary for the Haldimand Federation of Agriculture and current student in the program.
Huitema is also a third-generation egg farmer who works on her family’s farm located between Dunnville and Cayuga. She heard about this program when she was reading the March Edition of the Niagara Farmers Monthly: “I felt it was a good opportunity where I could brush up on my business management skills. I thought this certificate could be useful to learn towards our family egg farm.”
The course is designed to be completed online, enabling students to have some flexibility to set their own pace as they work through each module.
“Whenever I find some time, I sit down and tackle a section that is part of the certificate. At the end of each lesson, there is a quiz to pass before moving on,” explains Huitema.
Two topics in the course that are of particular interest to Huitema are ‘Managing Your Most Valuable Asset – Your People’ and ‘Succession Planning’, which Huitema says is a big issue for many family-run farms: “We all know many farmers are thinking about passing on the family farm to the next generation.”
Huitema recounts how her mother, Cindy, was raised on a mixed farm that included laying hens in Elmira, Ontario. In 1998, she and her husband Nick purchased her father’s quota to operate in Haldimand and later expanded the farm. In 2018, the family built a new layer barn equipped with an enriched colony housing system. Charlotte is now helping to continue their operations. To learn more about egg farming in Ontario, visit getcracking.ca/on-the-farm.
“The future of our egg farm is looking good, where the third generation has interest in continuing to help it grow,” states Huitema. “The family is proud to provide eggs to consumers across Ontario and we enjoy promoting eggs and sustainable egg farming at agricultural events.”
Huitema recommends the Farming Foundations and Agricultural Management course, noting the modules are easy to follow and understand, and that the topics are interesting and relevant. More information on this course is available at
guelphagriculturalmanagement.com.
