The Youth Employment and Skills Program provides a wage subsidy to employers who hire youth for agricultural jobs. The program offers support for 50% of wages to a maximum of $14,000.
Employers can apply on or after May 5, 2021 for their project to be considered. Projects may start retroactively as early as April 15, 2021.
Attending: Sandy Howell, Susan Frazer, Arnie Steeves, Callum McLeod, Russell Gammon Sec/Man
Regrets: Catherine Lord, Ed Cavanagh, Karen Cavanagh
Meeting by Zoom was called to order by Pres Howell at 8:35 pm.
Moved by Callum, seconded by Arnie that the agenda be approved with three additions, investment of portion of CGS funds, discussion of protein values added to milk awards, clarification of listings on goatgenetics.ca.
Moved by Callum, seconded by Arnie that the minutes of the Mar 19, 2021 meeting be approved.
Business arising from the March meeting:
–Due to covid restrictions the Vancouver Island Goat Assoc has had to cancel the 2021 West National Show. Also due to the covid restrictions and the short interval it was noted that it would not be likely that any other western province would be able to host it this year. A notice to apply for the 2022 West Nat will be in the next newsletter, FB page and website and will be due by June 30, 2021. The East Nat show is scheduled for the RAWF for 2021 and 2022.
–Judges will be contacted about the automatic extension of their licences for 2021 with no renewal fee.
–Callum and Adam and Ed have begun discussions for the creation of some webinars on judging and conformation evaluation and hope to have a release date of mid to late summer.
–Members are reminded that they can apply for Select Doe awards at any time, even posthumously.
Russell gave his report on the CGS bank balances: $6000 in chequing, and around $15,000 in savings with a surplus of over $4000 for the first quarter. Discussion of the possibility on investing a portion of the savings in a GIC ensued and Russell will investigate rates and options. It was noted that interest rates are very low at this time.
A discussion of milk recording followed and the new changes to the 305 program are now on the website. Also it was noted that covid restrictions have necessitated some changes – more owner sampler but even these lactations will qualify for the genetic testing.
A discussion of the importance of the protein values will result in further research with Brian at CCSI.
Also more explanations and clarification needs to be done for the goatgenetics.ca website so as members truly understand it. Items such as how the listings are weighted, and the reliability of the indexes between animals and what factors contribute to the index could be clarified.
The Annual Yearbook for the inclusion of *M and *P awards, Select Does etc will be the February issue. This issue also normally includes East and West National Champion winners if available.
Russell has been working on the backlog of *M certificates which will hopefully be mailed out soon. Brianna and Arnie are working on a new system for the future for the creation of these and other certificates.
Russell has also been working on cleaning up unpaid accounts, and members will be notified that if they are not paid their memberships will be suspended.
Also with regard to transactions at CLRC, any members not using a credit card must make sure to submit enough funds because if there is a shortfall their work being processed will not be sent out until it is completely paid for.
CGS will continue with revision to our classification program along with Brianna at CCSI.
Arnie moved that the meeting be terminated – 10:15 pm.
REPORT PREPARED BY SUSAN FRAZER
At the 2021 Annual Meeting of CGS members asked that the Board consider adjusting the deadline for National Show bids to host to an earlier date.
The deadline had been September 30th of the year previous with a decision soon thereafter.
The Board considered this request and moved the deadline to June 30th of the year previous effective with 2022 National Shows.
With regard to 2020 bids from the Vancouver Island Goat Association (Western) and the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair (RAWF) ( Eastern) had been approved. Covid-19 restrictions caused the cancelation of both these events in 2020.
For 2021 the Board had once again approved the bid from the VIGA for the Western National and in Eastern Canada Brooklin Spring Fair had been approved as host.
Both these events have been cancelled.
An application from the RAWF had been received. This bid was approved when Brookline Spring Fair had to cancel their event. Time will tell if this event can be held.
The Board has already approved the RAWF as host of the 2022 East National in recognition of the 100th anniversary of the Royal that year.
CGS is now entertaining bids to host the 2022 West National Show with a deadline of June 30, 2021 for applications.
Applications should be forwarded to the CGS office.
Both before and at the February 20th board meeting members expressed an interest in reporting of actions at CGS Board of Directors meetings.
The board welcomed this interest and is now beginning a process of reporting after each meeting. Here is the first Board meeting report prepared by President Sandy Howell. After each regular Board meeting a member of the Board will provide a report of discussion and decisions at each meeting.
Report prepared by President Sandy Howell, who is also director from British Columbia.
CGS Board Meeting held via Zoom March 19, 2021
Meeting called to order 8:37 pm EST.
Opening comments by President Sandy Howell discussion on milk recording/ testing-focus: ways of getting more members to participate. Sandy Howell and Catherine Lord are going to create a working paper of proposals for the Board.
Business arising from minutes of three Board meetings in February, prior to the Annual Meeting:
Discussion on overdrafts at CLRC, resulting form submission of insufficient funds to cover the costs of the registration, transfer, membership, etc. e.g. taxes or miscalculation of fees ending in CLRC collecting accounts receivable from members and clients. Earlier this year CGS wrote off several hundred dollars on very aged accounts receivable at CLRC. ( These were from 2015 and earlier and clients are no longer active in the industry. Also a number of accounts under $3.00-most under $1.50 from December 2019 and earlier were written off. Decision was made to notify CLRC that we will no longer accept overdrafts of any amount and this has been actioned. Consequently, if enough money isn’t sent in to cover the cost of work being done members/clients will no longer receive their work until bill paid. No more overdrafts. Suggestion is that members either do e-transfer or credit card transactions, if at all possible.
An In Camera session was held.
Reports on:
Office move is completed. The office in Guelph has been closed due to the covid pandemic and moved to the Secretary/Manager’s residence.
Barry Van Camp is the representative for the Royal Agriculture Winter Fair Board of Governors.
Financial statements to the end of February were reviewed.
New Business:
Meeting adjourned at 10:02 pm Eastern Standard Time.
Reports presented at the 2021 AGM of CGS on February 20, 2021 have now been loaded under the heading ANNUAL REPORT OF CGS (AGM2021) in the INFO AND LINKS section of this website. Included are minutes of the 2021 AGM, reports from Directors, Committees and the Secretary-Manager and a review of Canadian National Goat Federation actions during 2020.
We commend these documents to your review and study.
2020 was a year of growth and progress and we look froward to much more of the same in 2021!
A package for new CGS members and those new to the world of goat keeping has been created by the Board of directors of CGS.
This package can be found in the INFO & LINKS section of this website.
There is a wealth of valuable information in this document which will assist members with registering and caring for their animals and participating in CGS programs for genetic improvement and marketing of their animals.
We invite newer goat owners to review this package. CGS is here to answer any questions stimulated by studying the material in it.
And feel free to direct any new goat owners to the overall website and this particular package.
Direct Link:
In mid-November the Canadian Livestock Records Corporation informed their member associations that the unit charge for processing registry work was increasing by 2%.
The Board of each member organization thus had to consider how they would respond to this news.
In late 2019 member associations were informed that the unit charge for processing work at CLRC was increasing by 17%. This provoked a detailed examination of the CGS fee schedule and some noticeable adjustments to fees were made.
The CGS Board carefully considered the latest news of the 2% fee increase from CLRC.
Their decision was to implement a very modest increase in fees, as of January 2021, to ensure that CGS was staying ahead of increased processing costs.
They prefer this route to periodic larger increases in fees.
CGS worked with CLRC to review proposed changes to allow CLRC time to program the changes and update our fee schedule.
Any registry work submitted electronically or mailed by December 31st will be processed based on the current fee schedule.
Work submitted electronically, or mailed, on or after January 1, 2021 will be processed based on the new fee schedule.
Should you have any questions please contact your local director or the CGS office.
The fee schedule will be available on the CGS website at www.goats.ca under INFO and LINKS or via the CLRC website at www.clrc.ca and on the CGS page under Associations.
CGS’ Board is determined to operate the association on a businesslike basis.
Week of December 21st
We will be available via email and by phone all week until noon on December 24th
Week of December 28th
We will be available Monday the 28th, Tuesday the 29th, Wednesday the 30th and Thursday the 31st from 8:30 am Eastern till noon Eastern. Regular hours: 8:30 am Eastern till 4:30 pm Eastern on the first three days.
We wish all members and clients a wonderful Christmas and a great launch into 2021!
On Friday, December 18th a draft version of the national code of practice for care and handling of goats was released. Release of the draft version of the code represents a huge step forward in updating and enhancing the existing code of practice which was released in 2003.
Goat producers representing the meat, dairy and fibre aspects of goat production were involved in an enormous amount of work creating this draft. They were joined in their work by industry partner experts in animal health and care. We are posting the draft version along with this notice.
The time has arrived for YOU to make your comments about the draft. The comment period is open until February 22, 2021.
The CGS Board encourages all goat owners to study the draft code. If you have any comments on any aspect/aspects of the code please do so.
It is very simple to both access the code online and to provide your input. Simply click on this link and follow the instructions: https://www.nfacc.ca/codes-of-practice/goats
Just click on the red box on the top right of the screen and it will take you to the survey page where you can enter your comments.
This is a very important development for the all segments of the goat industry in Canada. We strongly encourage you to review the draft and make any and all comments you regard as appropriate.
THANKS!