Recovery Won't Be Quick For CN Rail

CN Rail's Chief Legal Officer says it's time for the illegal rail blockades to end.

 

Sean Finn, who also serves as Executive Vice President of Corporate Services, notes it will take some time for the railway to recover. He says for the entire grain season, they are 218,000 metric tonnes behind.

 

"This recovery and the challenges we have will have an impact on our capability of meeting grain spots that are set out in our grain plan," he commented. "We're going to have a challenge getting empty cars back from Vancouver, but we're working on it every day and hopefully within 2 or 3 weeks, we'll have recovered."

 

As of Friday morning, Finn notes the blockade at Belleville, Ontario remains active which essentially cuts off Eastern and Western Canada from any rail traffic on CN as well as products coming from Eastern Canada going to the U.S. He says court orders have been issued on the illegal blockades which began two weeks ago. There was also a blockade between Prince George, BC and Prince Rupert, BC that lasted six days. It came down last week.

 

Finn expects that law officials will act accordingly.

 

"We have gotten court orders across the country, every blockade. We fully expect that law enforcement will do what they have to do to have these court orders respected. We understand that they have operational control, how it's done and when it's done."

 

He further explained what impact the rail blockades are having on country.

 

"Canadians have a right to protest, they should do so peacefully but we really don't understand why they do so on an active railway line impacting what we call CN's backbone of the economy. We move Canada's goods to market and having a protest that essentially shuts down the railway has an impact of shutting down the economy, impacting businesses and impacting people's livelihoods. It's a safety issue but it's also understanding that these protests have a direct impact on Canada's reputation abroad but also on our capability of moving Canada's goods to market both through the ports but also to the U.S."

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.