More farmers looking at organic potential
High prices and the prospect of fewer input costs are attracting more farmers to organic farming in Manitoba.
At least 30 farmers began a transition in 2015, convinced they can become more profitable using a farming system that also costs less to operate, says provincial organic specialist Laura Telford.
They are conventional farmers who’ve crunched the numbers and are seeing a business case to convert, she said.
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Organic potatoes a tough row to hoe — but profitability makes the effort to produce them worthwhile
It was more than a hunch that prompted one of Canada’s leading potato producers to begin to transition a few acres to an organic production system in 1999.
The evidence was mounting that organics had potential, said Wayne Rempel, CEO of Kroeker Farms Ltd. in an interview.
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Organic conference draws a crowd
The game of chess isn't learned easily, requires forward thinking and you have to like playing it. That's why University of Manitoba Plant Scientist Martin Entz compares it to organic farming.
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Conversion to organic paid off for this Pipestone-area farm
Owners of a Pipestone-area farm that has more than tripled its cropped acres in less than a decade say its all due to switching from conventional to organic.
Bryce Lobreau, who farms with his parents Danny and Robin, said they decided to transition their farm in 2009 to add more value to their small livestock operation.
“We were just trying to create some extra income out of the cattle,” said Lobreau. “Times were gruelling through the recession.”
It might have seemed like a gamble at a time when consumers of organics were also feeling the pinch of a downturned economy.
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Editorial: Ideology and modern farming
Whenever the subject of organic agriculture surfaces in a discussion about modern farming, the “yabuts” start flowing fast and sometimes, furiously.
Ya but organic farmers don’t produce as much as “conventional‚” farmers do, so if everyone went organic, there would be shortages, more pressure on land and higher food prices. And so it goes.
Those “yabuts‚”are rooted in a certain ideology about agriculture that is deeply entrenched in practice, policy and even our language — a view that organic agriculture is an outdated and inefficient farming system that romanticizes the good old days.
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Seed grower’s website provides cover crop info
A Saskatchewan farmer is creating a how-to website for cover cropping in Western Canada.
Kevin Elmy, who runs Friendly Acres Seed Farm in Saltcoats, Sask., set up a website this winter calledcovercrops.ca. It provides a list of seed retailers selling cover crops and the types of species for sale.
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Agriculture at the crossroads
The art of agriculture or, for some, its spiritual essence, should be valued as much as the science, says a farmer from Ontario.
“We have to realize everything is interconnected and we cannot live in isolation,” Chris Boettcher told the Guelph Organic Conference Jan. 29.
“It may be that we’re entering the second age of enlightenment.”
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High-disturbance seeding can be as erosive as a plow
The era of black summerfallow is over, and direct seeding and zero tillage have pretty much solved problems of soil erosion on the Prairies. Or so goes conventional wisdom.
Not so, says David Lobb, a professor in the University of Manitoba’s department of soil science and senior research chair for the Watershed Systems Research Program (WSRP).
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