Agriculture
Diet, Injections, and Injunctions

From the Brownstone Institute
By
After the lockdowns of 2020 and the vaccine mandates of 2021, most Americans have heard about the idea of medical freedom and many have concerns about informed consent. One in four of our countrymen say they know someone who was seriously injured or killed by the Covid vaccines. The need for informed consent in medicine is apparent. But far fewer know anything about food freedom, or why it matters.
Medical freedom and food freedom are two sides of the same coin, and unless we fight to protect both, we will have neither.
Looking to the future in his 1951 book The Impact of Science on Society, the Nobel Prize-winning British mathematician, philosopher, and eugenicist Bertrand Russell forecast a future where the elites would use science as a means to control the population: “Diet, injections, and injunctions will combine, from a very early age, to produce the sort of character and the sort of beliefs that the authorities consider desirable, and any serious criticism of the powers that be will become psychologically impossible. Even if all are miserable, all will believe themselves happy, because the government will tell them that they are so.”
In The Scientific Outlook, Russell also wrote: “[In the future], [children’s] diet(s) will not be left to the caprices of parents, but will be such as the best biochemists recommend.”
While this likely sounded far-fetched to most of Russell’s contemporaries, his words capture our current era with alarming accuracy. In the past three years, millions of Americans saw their lives and livelihoods destroyed through injections and injunctions. Small businesses were decimated by the lockdowns. Legions of hard-working people faced ruin for demanding their right of informed consent – to evaluate the facts regarding any so-called medical treatment and to decide for themselves if they wanted it. They were fired for refusing the vaccine. They were killed with remdesivir. They died when doctors and bureaucrats denied them the truly safe and effective treatments they demanded, such as ivermectin.
Some of you are among the brave few who stood up in that moment and did what was right, to protect patients and vulnerable people at great cost to yourselves. I applaud you for this. You know first-hand what it means to have the boot of Injections and Injunctions on your face.
Now the third piece of the control grid Russell laid out must come into focus: diet. The battle to control you through what you eat is very real. It threatens to destroy what sovereignty we have left, and it is being perpetrated by the very same people who brought you “safe and effective injections” and “two weeks to slow the spread.”
The Covid lockdowns revealed the weakness of our overly centralized supply food chain on a global level. Government-mandated shutdowns disrupted food distribution hubs and shuttered meat processing plants, causing chaos, riots, and unrest worldwide as people scrambled to find food for their families. The situation deteriorated further when Russia invaded Ukraine, the breadbasket of Europe; numerous countries in Asia and Africa depended on Ukrainian grain for their sustenance. The decreased harvest drove up grain prices around the world, contributing to terrible food shortages for millions.
In 2023, 282 million people globally experienced high levels of acute hunger – an increase of 8.5 percent from 2022’s already elevated levels. In the United States, one in eight American households lacked adequate food in 2022, according to a report from the US Department of Agriculture.
You’d think this would be the time to support farmers around the world who are trying to feed the hungry masses, and to encourage local food systems that are resilient in the face of supply-chain disruption. Instead, in country after country, World Economic Forum-affiliated leaders are cracking down on independent farmers and forcing them to comply with draconian new rules in the name of combating climate change.
In Sri Lanka, the World Economic Forum-affiliated Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe banned all chemical fertilizers in a bid to combat climate change, forcing farms to go organic overnight, something which any organic farmer will tell you is a recipe for disaster – making a change like this, even on a single farm, takes planning and time. Combined with an acute diesel shortage, this edict left farms unable to operate, leading to soaring food prices and famine. The situation became so dire that in 2022, hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankans rioted, invaded the presidential palace, and overthrew their government.
In Ireland, the agricultural sector has been ordered to cut carbon emissions by 25% in the next seven years. This requirement will drive many farms into bankruptcy and will force the culling of hundreds of thousands of cows.
In Canada, the goal is fertilizer reduction of 30%, including reductions in manure use on organic farms – the only viable alternative to chemical fertilizer. Farmers are ringing the alarm bells that this policy will devastate the food supply. Even though milk prices are hitting record levels, Canadian officials still force farmers to dump their milk if they produce more than an arbitrary quota. Dairy owners are banned from giving the milk away to neighbors or homeless shelters. In Ontario, farmers cannot sell their milk directly to consumers at all, but must sell it to a single government-approved body which then decides how it is distributed.
In the Netherlands, the government is requiring a 30% reduction in livestock and mandating cuts in nitrogen of up to 95% – nitrogen that is released from cow manure and, if used properly, is an earth-friendly fertilizer. The government also plans to seize and shut down up to 3,000 farms to meet climate objectives. Protests by Dutch farmers have been met with force, including the police firing live ammunition rounds at protesters.
Denmark, Belgium, and Germany are considering similar nitrogen reduction policies. Both the UK and US have already put schemes into place to pay farmers not to farm. In huge areas of the Midwest, large corporations are seizing prime farmland by eminent domain to install solar farms – installations that could instead be built in sunny, arid deserts where they would not disrupt the food supply.
All of this is happening at a time when we need more food and farms, not a reduction.
In the United States, there are many small, regenerative organic farms that raise pastured meats, dairy, and poultry on perennial pastures, without the use of chemical fertilizers, using animal manure to feed the grasses in a beautiful holistic cycle that is environmentally friendly and has starkly lower methane and carbon emissions compared to industrial farming. It reduces nitrogen runoff into rivers and streams and prevents erosion. If our government truly cared about climate change and human health, bureaucrats and scientists would be visiting these farms, begging to learn how to implement their methods to save the planet. Instead, these farmers are facing increased harassment and raids by armed agents seeking to shut down their operations.
You may have heard about Amos Miller, the Amish farmer from Lancaster, Pennsylvania who has been facing persecution from the CDC, FDA, and USDA for 7 years now for the unforgivable crime of providing raw milk and farm-processed, non-USDA inspected meats to customers who know what they are getting and want it exactly that way. We’ll get into why his customers want non-USDA-inspected meats later in this series. But for now, know that such raids are frequent and are threatening our ability to access local, healthy, environmentally friendly meats and dairy.
Since 2020 there has been a significant increase in the number of unexplained fires and other events damaging farms, barns, food warehouses, food pantries, and the food supply chain in general, prompting the FBI to warn that the food system is under threat from cyberattacks.
So why is this happening? Why is our food supply being disrupted, seemingly on purpose? And who is behind this global assault on our farmers?
Agriculture
Lacombe meat processor scores $1.2 million dollar provincial tax credit to help expansion

Alberta’s government continues to attract investment and grow the provincial economy.
The province’s inviting and tax-friendly business environment, and abundant agricultural resources, make it one of North America’s best places to do business. In addition, the Agri-Processing Investment Tax Credit helps attract investment that will further diversify Alberta’s agriculture industry.
Beretta Farms is the most recent company to qualify for the tax credit by expanding its existing facility with the potential to significantly increase production capacity. It invested more than $10.9 million in the project that is expected to increase the plant’s processing capacity from 29,583 to 44,688 head of cattle per year. Eleven new employees were hired after the expansion and the company plans to hire ten more. Through the Agri-Processing Investment Tax Credit, Alberta’s government has issued Beretta Farms a tax credit of $1,228,735.
“The Agri-Processing Investment Tax Credit is building on Alberta’s existing competitive advantages for agri-food companies and the primary producers that supply them. This facility expansion will allow Beretta Farms to increase production capacity, which means more Alberta beef across the country, and around the world.”
“This expansion by Beretta Farms is great news for Lacombe and central Alberta. It not only supports local job creation and economic growth but also strengthens Alberta’s global reputation for producing high-quality meat products. I’m proud to see our government supporting agricultural innovation and investment right here in our community.”
The tax credit provides a 12 per cent non-refundable, non-transferable tax credit when businesses invest $10 million or more in a project to build or expand a value-added agri-processing facility in Alberta. The program is open to any food manufacturers and bio processors that add value to commodities like grains or meat or turn agricultural byproducts into new consumer or industrial goods.
Beretta Farms’ facility in Lacombe is a federally registered, European Union-approved harvesting and meat processing facility specializing in the slaughter, processing, packaging and distribution of Canadian and United States cattle and bison meat products to 87 countries worldwide.
“Our recent plant expansion project at our facility in Lacombe has allowed us to increase our processing capacities and add more job opportunities in the central Alberta area. With the support and recognition from the Government of Alberta’s tax credit program, we feel we are in a better position to continue our success and have the confidence to grow our meat brands into the future.”
Alberta’s agri-processing sector is the second-largest manufacturing industry in the province and meat processing plays an important role in the sector, generating millions in annual economic impact and creating thousands of jobs. Alberta continues to be an attractive place for agricultural investment due to its agricultural resources, one of the lowest tax rates in North America, a business-friendly environment and a robust transportation network to connect with international markets.
Quick facts
- Since 2023, there are 16 applicants to the Agri-Processing Investment Tax Credit for projects worth about $1.6 billion total in new investment in Alberta’s agri-processing sector.
- To date, 13 projects have received conditional approval under the program.
- Each applicant must submit progress reports, then apply for a tax credit certificate when the project is complete.
- Beretta Farms has expanded the Lacombe facility by 10,000 square feet to include new warehousing, cooler space and an office building.
- This project has the potential to increase production capacity by 50 per cent, thereby facilitating entry into more European markets.
Related information
Agriculture
Unstung Heroes: Canada’s Honey Bees are not Disappearing – They’re Thriving

Canada’s Bee Apocalypse began in 2008. That was the year the Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists (CAPA) first reported unusually high rates of winter bee colony losses. At 35 percent, the winter die-off that year was more than twice the normal 15 percent rate of attrition.
“Successive annual losses at [these] levels … are unsustainable by Canadian beekeepers,” the CAPA warned. This set off an avalanche of dire media reports that now appear on a regular basis. Among the many examples over the years: Huge Honey Bee Losses Across Canada” and “Canada’s bee colonies see worst loss in 20 years”. As each of these stories reminds readers, the disappearance of honey bees will doom our food supply, given their crucial role in pollinating crops including canola, soyabeans, apples, tomatoes and berries.
This year the black-and-yellow striped Cassandras are back at work, with headlines shouting “Scientists warn of severe honeybee losses in 2025” and “The Bees are Disappearing Again”. If it’s spring, the bees must be disappearing. Again.
It is, however, mathematically impossible for any species to be in an allegedly continuous and calamitous state of decline over nearly two decades and never actually reduce in number. For despite the steady supply of grave warnings regarding their imminent collapse, Canada’s bees are actually buzzing with life.
In 2007, according to Statistics Canada, there were 589,000 honey bee colonies in Canada,; in 2024, they reached 829,000, just shy of 2021’s all-time high of 834,000. Figuring a conservative summertime average of 50,000 bees per colony, that means there are approximately 12 billion more honey bees in Canada today than when the Bee Apocalypse first hit.
As for beekeepers, their numbers have also been growing steadily, and now stand at 15,430 – the most recorded since 1988. As CAPA’s report acknowledges, “the Canadian beekeeping industry has been resilient and able to grow, as proven by the overall increase in the number of bee colonies since 2007 despite the difficulties faced every winter.”
How is this possible? As is usually the case where there’s a need to be filled, the market holds the answer.
It is true that Canadian honey bees face a long list of threats and challenges ranging from mites and viruses to Canada’s harsh winters. It is also true that they perform a crucial service in pollinating crops, the value of which is estimated at $7 billion annually. However, this underscores the fact that bees are a livestock bred for a particular agricultural purpose, no different from cattle, chickens or pen-raised salmon. They are a business.
And in spite of its alleged status as an environmental totem, the honey bee isn’t even native to North America. It was first imported by European settlers for its honey-making abilities in the 1600s. Since then, it has been cultivated with deliberate commercial intent – allowing it to outcompete native pollinators such as bumble bees and butterflies even though it is poorly suited to the local winter. (This highlights the irony of all those native-plant pollinator gardens virtuously installed in neighbourhoods across Canada that end up supporting an invasive honey bee population.)
The significance of the bee economy means that when a beehive collapses over the winter for whatever reason, beekeepers have plenty of motivation to regenerate that colony as swiftly as possible. While hives can create their own queens over time, this can be a slow process given the cold Canadian climate. The better option is to simply buy a new queen from a warmer country.
In 2024, Canada imported 300,000 queens worth $12 million, mostly from the U.S., Italy, Australia and Chile. That works out to $40 each. In a miracle of nature, each of these new queens can lay up to 2,500 eggs a day, and each egg takes just two to three weeks to reach full maturity as a worker or drone. It is also possible to import entire “bee packages” that include a queen and 8,000 to 10,000 bees.
As a result, even a devastating 50 percent winter loss rate, something that has occurred only rarely in Canada in individual provinces and never nationally, isn’t necessarily fatal to any beekeeping operation. The beekeeper can purchase imported queens in April, split their existing colonies and be back in business by May or June.
And regardless of the honey bee’s apparent difficulties with Canada’s unforgiving weather (efforts are ongoing to breed a hardier Canadian variant), there’s no shortage of bees worldwide. Earlier this year, the German statistical agency reported the global beehive count rose from 69 million in 1990 to 102 million in 2023. Another study looking back to 1961 by New Zealand researchers found the number of honey bee colonies has “nearly doubled” over this time, while honey production has “almost tripled.” As the New Zealand report observes, “Headlines of honey bee colony losses have given an
impression of large-scale global decline of the bee population that endangers beekeeping, and that the world is on the verge of mass starvation.” Such claims, the authors note, are “somewhat inaccurate.” In truth, things have never been better for bees around the world.
Here in Canada, the ability to import queens from other countries, together with their prodigious reproductive capabilities, backstops the amazing resiliency of the bee industry. Yes, bees die. Sometimes in large numbers. But – and this is the bit the headlines always ignore – they come back. Because the market needs them to come back.
If there is a real threat to Canada’s bee population, it’s not environmental. It’s the risk that unencumbered trade in bees might somehow be disrupted by tariffs or similar bone-headed human interventions. Left on their own, bees have no problem keeping busy.
The longer, original version of this story first appeared at C2CJournal.ca
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