Agricola Himalaya was a family-owned Colombian company, the national leader in the tea industry, and the owner of the only tea plantation in the country, located in the middle of a mist forest. In Colombia, owing to the labour costs involved in tea production, importing tea was less expensive than producing it locally, but if Agricola Himalaya decided to import the tea, what would be the environmental and social impact of closing the plant and plantation? .....more

In May 2021, Claire Reid, the founder of social enterprise start-up Reel Gardening, spoke about her ambitious ten-year plan to help secure nutritious food for impoverished people in South Africa and elsewhere in the world. Reel Gardening produced and sold a paper strip packed with seeds and fertilizer. Although the company had grown significantly, it had to manage the dual mission of social contribution and financial sustainability. The company had .....more

In November 2020, Paul Dietrich was wrapping up his busy harvest season for the 1,100 acres of farmland he currently operated. Although the fall harvest season demanded much of Dietrich’s time and attention, he simply could not ignore an investment opportunity that had been presented to him. A local farmland owner was selling a 150-acre parcel of farmland that adjoined some land parcels already owned by Dietrich. Dietrich estimated that a competitive .....more

The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic continued worldwide in 2021, and health experts were aware that the virus (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 [SARS-CoV-2]) could be transmitted between humans and mink. In light of this, Denmark had controversially ordered the killing of 17 million mink out of concern that mutations to the virus posed a risk to the effectiveness of any future COVID-19 vaccines. In early 2021, mink .....more

In 2018, the founder and owner of the Karatu Coffee Company needed to decide what to do next with his company. He was considering several options: increasing the tourism part of the business, growing the original farm, pursuing a property development project in the capital city, or simply selling out and walking away. The company, located in Tanzania, began as a coffee farm, expanded into tourism with a remote, idyllic coffee lodge, and then brought .....more

Makena Wanjiru, chair of Kiri Mount Kenya Conservation Network and Resource Centre (Kiri), wondered whether turning Kiri’s loans business into a co-operative bank would be in the group’s best interest. The challenge was to convince the rest of the board members of the idea. The board of directors would meet on July 18, 2019. Wanjiru had to draft a report before then explaining how the idea was consistent with the group’s current strategy and would .....more

Farmer Lee Farms was a family-owned farm 70 kilometres from Johannesburg, South Africa. The farm was founded in 2005 by Jimmy Botha, a sixty-year-old, first-generation Black commercial farmer. From 2005 to 2017, the farm had experienced steady growth and was recognized as a Black business success story in post-apartheid South Africa. During this period, the farm had a clear target market of high-end food packaging houses and food retailers and specialized .....more

ShakeeBee Honey Inc. was a relatively small producer of pure honey and beeswax and provider of pollination services located in central Newfoundland, Canada. The company needed to consider further expansion beyond the facility modernization it undertook in 2018; this expansion would involve acquiring additional land and attracting key personnel. In March 2020, the owner reached out to his accountant for assistance with a variety of accounting-related .....more

In September of 2020, an international business executive at the North Dakota Trade Office was asked by a client company, Dakota Growers Pasta Company Inc., to advise it on how to increase pasta exports to South Korea. Like many other firms in North Dakota, the client faced a number of hurdles to building successful export businesses. These included limited exposure to foreign markets and limited expertise in trade-related regulations and processes, .....more

In October 2018, Canada legalized recreational use of cannabis. One year later, in late 2019, after share prices had fallen significantly from their peak, investors were looking for favourable investment opportunities in the cannabis industry. HEXO Corp. and Aurora Cannabis Inc. were two cannabis companies that traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange and followed International Financial Reporting Standards. In such a young industry, many companies were .....more