Talk:Agriculture in Canada

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    Good article Agriculture in Canada was a nominee for good article, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

    Contents

    [edit] Random Good Article

    Decided to click the random article link tonight, and here we arrived. I must say this seems to be a really good article, which is very surprising considering how new it is. I am going to nominate it for possible GA-status. Great job, guys -- I'm way impressed. /Blaxthos 06:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] GA Failed: Notes for fixes

    I have reviewed this article for GA status, and have unfortunately had to fail it. The following improvements should be made, and then the article can be renominated at WP:WIAGA

    • Per Criteria 1 (quality of writing)
        • Y DoneThe BIG issue here is the lead. An article of this size should have a 2-3 paragraph lead to fully summarize it. 2 sentances are not going to cut it. See WP:LEAD for more info.
      • The article could use some serious copyediting. I can see several extra carriage returns, several spelling and capitalization errors, some additional wikilinking needed. This article needs some TLC in this area.
    • Per Criteria 2 (accuracy and attribution)
        • Y DoneSketchy in places. For an article of this size and bredth, I would expect to encounter a minimum of one inline reference per paragraph. Paragraph=new idea; new idea=new reference. Many sections have several paragraphs with no references, and other areas are missing several key references, especially when assertions of fact are made. For just one example (there are many more than this) the paragraph on Wheat under the Crops section. Another place is the fiber section. Contains several figures. Where do these numbers come from?
    • Criteria 3 looks good. I am not left for want in terms of broadness.
    • Criteria 4 looks good as well. This is NPOV.
    • Criteria 5 looks fine. Don't see any editwars.
    • Criteria 6 on images: *Y DoneLooks pretty good here. All of the images look appropriately liscenced, but I wonder if their usage is a bit gratuitous. I mean, they are all general agriculture pics; not many are specific to Canada. For example, the cow picture is taken of a Cow in Jersey, not Canada. One or two of these may be good, but I would have liked to see more Canadian-specific pictures.

    If you disagree with this review, and think the article was incorrectly reviewed then you can ask for remediation at WP:GA/R. If you have any other questions or comments, drop me a line at my talk page. Good luck, and happy editing! --Jayron32|talk|contribs 02:29, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

    Fixed several spelling mistakes, and re-worked first paragraph. Will seek out more Canadian pictures, find images frustrating uploaded to both Wikipedia and wikicommons, and not many have category listings. Will also fill out references over next while --SriMesh|talk Julia 05:37, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
    Hmmm.. *Y DoneThe new information is a great benefit to the article, but it looks misplaced. The lead should be a prose introduction that summarizes the article. Introducing copious data into it in the form of tables actually makes it less readable. The new tables are great and really belong in the article, just not in the lead. For more information on writing a good lead, see WP:LEAD.--Jayron32|talk|contribs 16:07, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
    P.S. I fixed your sig in a few placed, there is a carriage return and two spaces in it, which activates a weird box thingy in the wikipedia markup language. You may want to fix this in your preferences... --Jayron32|talk|contribs 16:07, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
    Thank you...will try new and improved signature on this edit of talk page :-) SriMesh|talk Julia 04:38, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
    Y DoneWell I read the WP:LEAD and other agricultural articles for other countries, Good Articles at random, and Featured Articles at random...and came up with this first paragraph. Will re-read it later and see again how to edit it. I think it combines the sections of the Agriculture in Canada article and follows WP:LEAD guide points...
    • Context -how various commodities are produced by province and its particular biogeography as it relates to the context: economy of Canada.
    • Characterization - what the term refers to as used in the given context. Tillage of the soil farming and ranching crops and livestock
    • Explanation - deeper meaning and background. Agricultural techniques and activities have evolved for the for food/feed/fiber production. Farming as well as raising and processing livestock has abandoned substinence agricultural practices in favour of tecnological intensive farming and agriculture economies.
    • Compare and contrast - how Agriculture in Canada compares and contrasts with past issues and future technological economies
    • Criticism - ends with current debates and challenges facing Agriculture scientists in Canada.

    Agri is from Latin ager, meaning "a field", and culture is from Latin cultura, meaning "cultivation" in the strict sense of tillage of the soil. A literal reading of the English word yields: tillage of the soil of a field. In modern usage, the word agriculture covers all activities essential to food/feed/fiber production, including all techniques for raising and processing livestock. SriMesh|talk Julia 04:38, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] Looking better

    This article is looking MUCH better. Some possible extra fixes:

      • Y DoneThe lead introduces a lot of information in the form of statistics and the like. In most cases, these kinds of statistics, with relevent references, should be introduced into the body of the article, not its lead. The lead should be a summary and should prepare the reader for what the article will talk about. Also, the use of tables in the lead doesn't feel very kosher. The tables look good, and belong in the article, but the lead may not be the place for them. Consider moving them to a better location in the article.
    Removed tables from the lead.
      • Y DoneSeveral parts still need better referencing.
    Looked up more references. Please add the error tag fact needed for more of these.
      • Y DoneConsider fixing the referencing style. WP:CITE is the relevent manual of style page on how to organize references. WP:CITET contains many citation templates that can be a BIG help in organizing and presenting references with complete bibliographic information.
    changed to use of citation templates.

    Hope that is of some more help. Keep up the good work. This article is improving a LOT. --Jayron32|talk|contribs 04:08, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] Re-nominate?

    I have worked on the article again, and fixed referencing style. Lead paragraph and table location have been fixed. SriMesh | talk 01:05, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] Failed GA

    • Y DoneLooking at the article history, the article has definitely come a long way since its previous GA review and is a lot closer to GA status than previously/ However, I don't think it is quite there yet and I have failed it GA status based on criteria 1(a) and 1(b), that is the writing style - particularly failing to comply with Wikipedia:Embedded list and ensuring that the "prose is clear and the grammar is correct". I also have doubts over its factual accuracy, alhtough I did not fail it specifically on this criterion also.
    • I have pulled several examples of poor grammar etc from the first 3 paragraphs alone:
    Y Done*"the ox and plow farmer proving up on his quarter section of land" This doesn't make any sense to me. What does proving up mean? What is a quarter section of land? Either these terms should be explained or wikilinked or else the sentence needs rephrasing in plainer english.
    Reply: Proving Up: Homestead External Link; Quarter Section: definition in this article, more development also follows in a further section.
    • Y DoneDomestically and internationally*"Domestically and internationally, some commodities have faced increased scrutiny from disease" How can a disease scrutinise a commodity? The choice of phrasing is poor and needs rewording
    Sentence has been re worded, more development follows in a further section.
    • Y Done"inland first nations developed" First Nations is a proper noun and should be capitalised
    • Y Done*"Agriculture in Canada began with First Nations tribal practiceswhere the gentlemen follow livestock movement" The use of "gentlemen" here to cover any male is very odd (beyond archaic into the realms of bizarre) where simply using "men" would be better. Also "follow" is present-tense, yet this is discussing events thousands of years in the past.
      • Y Done"as Upper Canada and Lower Canada before Rupert's Land " - Rupert's Land needs wikifying, I have no idea what or where it is.
    Done.
    • Y Done*Again, these are all examples from the first two paragraphs (maybe eight sentences) of the article. Much of the article is in a similar state, with very odd phrasing and erroneous grammer. It needs a damn good copyedit, preferably by a third party. See wikipedia League of Copyeditors if you need assistance with this. Placed in the hands of the wikipedia League of Copyeditors
    • Y DoneThere were also several sections containing too many lists and no prose - specifically "Canadian agricultural government departments" and "Industry categories"
    • I also took issue with a couple of factual discrepancies which concered me given that i'm certainly no expert on agriculture:
    • Y Done*"Agriculture in Canada is the production of various food/feed/fiber commodities to fulfill domestic and international human and animal sustenance needs." Surely agriculture is broader than simply materials for sustenance. This is the opening sentence in the article - it is vitally important since it does the most work in the article, sets the tone and summarises what the article is to cover. Yet this sentence says that agriculture does not involve for instance wool from sheep or wax from bees, which is surely wrong.
    • Y Done"The nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyle " This is referenced several times in discussion of early agriculture but is to my mind not a form of agriculture at all. Wikipedia's own article on agriculture defines it as "the production of food, feed, fiber, fuel and other goods by the systematic raising of plants and breeding and feeding animals." Clearly hunter-gathering is by definition pre-agricultural, yet the article includes it as an early agricultural activity. Again, it is vital that the article gets the very basic facts right in order to be considered factually accurate.

    Tied in the rationale for the hunter - gatherer knowledge as a prerequisite for the early domestication and agricultural processing methods.

    • In summary, this article is not yet ready for GA status, and would benefit from a thorough copyediting by a third-party (ie not the present authors) as well as being rigorously checked for factual accuracy by someone with subject knowledge - there are simply too many questionable statements even to a layman on the subject let alone an expert.
    • Many thanks - PocklingtonDan (talk) 18:00, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
    Reply to above analysis: Wiki links added to help define some above definition clarifications. Re worded lead paragraph definition and history section. Placed article in the hands of the wikipedia League of Copyeditors for more assistance as well. Thank you for your comments! SriMesh | talk 05:54, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] Canada's Supply Management agricultural/dairy/poultry system: info needed

    It seems like Canada's Supply Management system is missing here. I hope someone can add a new section or disambiguation about it.

    I'm thinking of things like explained int this article, quotas, etc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dairy_Farmers_of_Manitoba "The Dairy Farmer board meets 2 to 3 days each month to set policy for Manitoba's dairy farmers, hear reports of marketing activity, review quotas and Canadian requirements for milk and dairy products.

    The Board buys from producers and sells to processors. The average is about 25 million litres of milk per month worth about $16 million. Dairy producers share equally in all markets, both fluid and industrial. The board conducts one pool of revenue monthly and pays producers according to the amount and quality of milk marketed.

    The Dairy Farmers of Manitoba takes an active role in Dairy Farmers of Canada, the Canadian Milk Supply Management and Keystone Agricultural Producers'."

    You can find an American farmer perspective on the Supply Management system here to jumpstart some thinking to add to this article: http://www.newrules.org/journal/nrfall00farmer.html "New Rules Project - The New Rules - Fall 2000 - When the Farmer Makes the Rules canadian wheat board antitrust supply management"

    http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:WTEf6gGpMNEJ:www.cfo.on.ca/_pdfs/SupplyManagementinCanadaOpEd-Final.pdf+supply+management+poultry&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=ca&client=firefox-a "Supply Management is a Model for Doing Agriculture the Right Way canadian wheat board newrules farmers"

    I guess the Canadian Wheat Board and supply management are somehow inter-related, they both sprung from the Great Depression IIRC. However, I can't find ANYTHING on Supply management on Wikipedia sadly.

    99.245.173.200 09:34, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

    Added some information about this topic. Canada's Supply ManagementSriMesh | talk 03:23, 19 January 2008 (UTC)


    [edit] Failed "good article" nomination

    This article failed good article nomination. This is how the article, as of January 27, 2008, compares against the six good article criteria:

    1. Well written?: The articles fails to comply with the Manual of Style in several places, and needs some prose work. The first sentence of the lead is far too verbose. WP:MOS#Images discourages stacking images in a row on the right, as is done all over the article. Also, the lead is one enormous chunk of text, it needs to be broken out in to proper paragraphs. There are other sections that need this, and some places where there are single sentence paragraphs that need to be consolidated in to other portions of text. There are also places where the seealso function is done improperly (Agriculture companies of Canada), the proper templates (such as {{seealso}}, {{mainarticle}} and others) should be used.
    2. Factually accurate?: The article does make sufficient use of in-line citations, good work. But some of the references in the cites are improperly formatted or lack adequate information for good verification of their reliability (example: ref number 18).
    3. Broad in coverage?: The GA criteria requires that an article be broad and stay on topic. This article has serious issues when evaluated for this. Agriculture is defined as "the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock and in varying degrees the preparation and marketing of the resulting products" (Merriam-Websters). This never includes hunting and gathering (as in the history section), and it also never includes fisheries in general (though it might include aquaculture). In other words, the article strays in places from its topic of agriculture in Canada. More importantly, the article fails to adequately cover the major concepts of organic farming, sustainable agriculture, family farms versus agrobusiness, and the environmental impact of Canadian agriculture (there's a lot more to it than drought, soil conservation and GM). It also fails to mention other factors such as goats, and even where it presents info on a subject it may fail to place it in proper context. For example: it mentions sheep and wool statistics. But what it fails to mention is that Canadian sheep production has fallen dramatically since the mid-20th century, and that it often actually costs more to shear sheep than their wool is worth. This fails to make the bigger picture of Canadian agriculture clear.
    4. Neutral point of view?: The article fails to give fair representation to all significant points view, per the lack of coverage mentioned in the above criterion.
    5. Article stability? No on-going edit wars.
    6. Images?: All images are accounted for with proper licenses.

    For articles that are close to GA status but need minor changes, a hold period should be provided in order to give editors a chance to make such changes. But where a major rewrite is required, a hold should not be provided. Especially because of the broadness issues present in the article, a hold isn't appropriate in my estimation.

    When these issues are addressed, the article can be renominated. If you feel that this review is in error, feel free to take it have it reassessed. Thank you for your work so far.— VanTucky 04:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)