Roderick Joseph MacSween
Rod MacSween, the architect of the dairy industry in Eastern Nova Scotia, is known for his humility, dedication and sincerity. This, coupled with incredible foresight and concern for the farmers in the area, makes him one of the agricultural leaders of the Atlantic Provinces.
Rod was born in Ironville, Cape Breton County. He completed his high school education in Sydney and returned to the home farm from where he shipped milk to Sydney. Because of his involvement with a producer organization, the dairy stopped buying his milk and thus ended his farming career.
In 1941 he accepted a position with the Cape Breton's Dairyman's as a milk driver salesman. In 1944 he attended a dairy short course at the Ontario Agricultural College and in 1945 was appointed Dairy Department Manager of the Eastern Co-operative Services in Antigonish.
During the next 25 years Rod played a major role in shaping the dairy industry. He organized milk marketing in Eastern Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, and Newfoundland, as General Manager of Eastern Co-operative Services and later of Eastern Dairyfoods Co-op Ltd.
As an efficient and progressive manager, he never forgot the needs of the milk producers and farmers in general. He was a strong supporter of co-operatives and was always in favour of producer control of the marketing system.
Rod served as Secretary of the Antigonish Federation of Agriculture and the Antigonish County Milk Producers Association, as Secretary-Manager of the Antigonish Fall Fair, and is a member of the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture Senate Club.
Rod has given freely of his time to assist developing countries to establish marketing co-operatives and community self-help programs, to lead development seminars and, at the request of the Canadian Hunger Foundation and the Co-operative Development Foundation, he has traveled to India on two occasions to evaluate their aid programs to the developing dairy industry in that Country.
Rod MacSween has also served on the Milk Marketing Review Committee and is offering his assistance in the Nova Scotia Dairy Industry Study.