This extends the $250,000 limit, which was set in March 2025.

Producers can receive an additional $250,000 interest free on canola only for a total of $500,000.

“By increasing the interest-free portion of the Advance Payments Program, we’re helping farmers manage costs, while giving them more flexibility to market their products on their terms,” Agriculture and Agri-Food Minister Heath MacDonald said in an April 1 news release.

The program offers up to $1 million to Canadian farmers based on the expected value of their agricultural products. Twenty-four industry groups across Canada deliver the program.

The Canadian Federation of Agriculture praised the extension of the $250,000 interest-free limit.

“Maintaining the $250,000 interest free portion reflects the realities farmers are facing today,” said CFA president Keith Currie.

“We are seeing continued volatility in input costs, supply chains and global markets, and this type of support is important in helping farmers navigate those pressures.”

“We look forward to continuing to work with government to secure a permanent increase to the interest free portion of the program, so that producers have the predictability they need to make informed business decisions in an increasingly complex operating environment,” he added.

The post Advance Payments Program interest free limit set at $250,000 for 2026 appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

It ends a 75-year run as a frozen vegetable processor in the area, according to a social media post by Johnson Fresh Farms from Barnwell, one of the many fresh vegetable contractors to be affected, producing the sweet Taber corn the area is known for.

WHY IT MATTERS: Nortera plant closure in June leaves several southern Alberta producers scrambling to figure out what to put in their crop rotations with upcoming loss of contracts.

The affected 6,000 contracted acres in the southern Alberta produces 40 million pounds of frozen vegetables according to Johnson Fresh Farms.

“(It) is affecting several jobs and family farms including ours scrambling to figure out what we are going to grow to replace all those vegetable acres with,” said Johnson Fresh Farms in its post.

“That is why we are encouraging everyone to support your local farms and everyone that will be affected when the plant permanently closes. We have some ideas, but we’re gonna need your support, so stay tuned to find out.”

The news comes on the heels of Quebec-based Nortera buying in late October, the Green Giant and Le Sieur brands in Canada from New Jersey-based B&G Foods, and investing $28 million in its Saint-Denis-sur-Richelieu plant. Nortera also announced the closure of its Saint-Césaire plant which was scheduled for late January 2026.

The move has been dubbed a “strategic restructuring of its Canadian frozen facilities” according to a company press release, in a market increasingly challenged by international imports.

Over the coming months, production volumes and certain equipment from the Lethbridge plant will be transferred to several of the company’s other frozen facilities.

“Closing a facility is never an easy decision, especially given the dedication of our Lethbridge team,” said Hugo Boisvert, CEO of Nortera in a press release.

“Current market pressures have made it essential for us to consolidate our operations. By optimizing our manufacturing footprint, we are securing the future and the competitiveness of Nortera.”

The transition will affect approximately 70 employees at the plant.

Nortera is North America’s leading processor of frozen and canned vegetables. It operates 13 plants in Canada and the U.S.

The post Nortera’s Lethbridge plant closure ends 75 years of frozen vegetable processing in southern Alberta appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

AAFC cautioned that the conflict in Iran “has heightened geopolitical tensions and market volatility,” and noted that planting decisions could be altered while “the report is based on information and trade policies in effect as of March 11, 2026.”

Canola

• Projected canola ending stocks for 2025-26 were left unchanged at 2.76 million tonnes, while the 2026-27 forecast was cut by 200,000 tonnes from February at 1.46 million tonnes.

• Given average yields, AAFC forecast Canadian canola production in 2026-27 at 19.20 million tonnes, which was unchanged from the February estimate and down from the 21.80 million tonnes grown in 2025-26.

Wheat

• New crop wheat ending stocks were raised to 5.75 million tonnes from 5.70 million in February, while the 2025-26 wheat carryout held at 7.35 million tonnes.

• AAFC raised its call on wheat production to 35.01 million tonnes, from 34.98 million the previous month. That would still be well below the 39.96 million tonnes harvested in 2025-26.

Pulses

• Other notable revisions included slight increases in pea and lentil production estimates, with ending stocks of the two pulses also up by 100,000 tonnes each from the previous forecast.

• The pea carryout for 2026-27 was raised to 945,000 tonnes from 845,000 tonnes in February, while lentils were forecast at 1.67 million from 1.57 million tonnes.

• Pea ending stocks for the current marketing year are estimated at 1.31 million tonnes with lentils at 1.695 million tonnes.

Soybeans/Corn

• Corn ending stocks for both 2025-26 and 2026-27 were left at 2.00 million tonnes.

• Soybean carryout for 2026-27 was cut by 50,000 tonnes from February, at 693,000 tonnes, which compares with 443,000 for the current marketing year.

March estimates for Canadian major crops supply and demand: in million tonnes. Source: Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

The post Agriculture Canada makes small balance sheet adjustments appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

In a March 9 letter to Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Heath MacDonald, the group called for an “immediate pause on closures and employee terminations for a minimum of 24 months” so the government can re-evaluate decisions and protect “irreplaceable components of the research system, or offer enhancements to Canada’s agriculture landscape that may have been overlooked.”

WHY IT MATTERS: The planned closure of seven federal research centres and farms across Canada has been widely panned by agriculture groups, which say Canada could be less innovative and competative as a result.

The letter also calls for full transparency on the decision-making process and disclosure of any impact analysis done.

The group includes groups like the National Farmers Union (NFU), Canadian Organic Growers, Alberta Federation of Agriculture and Canadian Seed Growers Association.

The groups say the research cuts, which included over 600 staff and seven research stations, were made without consultation with farm groups or proper cost-benefit analysis.

It also criticized the suggestion universities and the private sector could make up for research cut by the government.

Universities “are cash-strapped, and grant funding is short term, precarious, and often tied to commercial partners,” the groups wrote. “They do not have access to the secure, dedicated land base or provide the stability required for long-term studies and multi-site plant breeding trials or agronomic studies.”

Private sector research, it added, is “shaped by commercial priorities and cannot address the range of research topics needed by farmers or for Canada’s long-term food and agriculture sector’s success.”

It also said research at the shuttered stations are vital to combating complex issues like climate change and disease.

“It is increasingly clear to us that the decision to eliminate this critical public research infrastructure was made without considering its true value to farmers, the Canadian public and the future of our food and agriculture system,” the groups said.

In hearings before the House of Commons agriculture committee, federal Agriculture Minister Heath MacDonald said it’s too expensive to keep all research facilities open. Operational costs had been allowed to get “out of hand,” he said in a February hearing, and the sites had substantial maintenance backlogs.

The cuts to AAFC research and staffing have also drawn criticism from opposition MPs.

The post Farm groups call on agriculture minister to pause federal research cuts appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Finalists will be selected this spring, with up to two winners to be announced in 2028, who will each receive up to $1 million to scale their solutions.

Leduc, a sheep and beef farmer with a PhD in animal science from Université Laval who completed post-graduate work with McGill and Lactanet, kept running into the same issue: Farmers are being encouraged to adopt best management practices for forages, but few had the data needed to know whether those changes actually worked.

“Forage systems are long-term systems,” he said.

“If you make a mistake in seeding, you might not see the impact for a long time. If you choose the wrong bull, it’s two years before you fully understand the outcome.”

That makes it harder to connect management decisions to results — and even harder to justify change. The core problem, Leduc said, is data.

“In forage systems, data is not collected in a standardized way. Producers want answers right away. But to get analytics, you need data — and in forage, that takes time,” he said, adding this gap limits progress not only on productivity, but also on greenhouse gas reductions.

Enter Mon Système Fourrager, an integrated platform that connects data “from soil to animal,” letting users log and import field management data, harvest information, forage and silage analyses, and observations such as winter survival or stand density.

Leduc also acquired and is modernizing EweManage, a sheep and goat management software program, and is developing Agri-Doc, a module for agronomists to easily log information during farm visits, generate reports required for provincial support programs and transcribe voice notes directly into structured records. The goal is to make data capture faster and less burdensome.

“Data collection is like accounting —rationally, it’s good. Emotionally, it’s boring.”

Maxime Leduc

He is also experimenting with mobile chatbot interfaces that will allow producers to ask questions and receive insights based on their own Excel-based records.

According to Leduc, helping producers measure yields, track forage analyses and link feed quality to animal performance will support more precise feeding strategies that can improve digestibility, reduce methane intensity and increase overall farm efficiency.

Leduc emphasized that practices that reduce emissions often also improve profitability — but only if producers can see and measure the impact.

“You need to recognize you have a problem, know the possible solutions, evaluate them and then monitor the results,” he said.

“Without data, you can’t do that.”

Rather than marketing directly to individual producers one by one, Leduc is focusing on partnerships with forage labs and agronomists who already need to collect and interpret data. If advisers adopt the platform, producers are more likely to follow.

He currently has a few hundred users of his technologies, mostly in Quebec, where he works closely with a network of producers, agronomists, agricultural organizations like the Canadian Forage and Grassland Association, and forage labs.

Next milestones include launching the agronomists’ tool and hopefully advancing to the final round of the methane challenge, which would provide an additional grant of up to $500,000 to support further development and testing of his system. He’s also received funding from Investissement Quebec.

His longer-term vision is straightforward: keep the business viable and help producers become more profitable while reducing their environmental footprint. The forage sector’s future depends on closing the data gap, he says.

“The answer lies in accessing and leveraging the data producers already collect, but don’t use fully,” he said.

The post From soil to stall: the digital platform closing the data gap in methane reduction appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

AAFC projected total planted area for 2026/27 at 31.70 million hectares, slipping 103,000 from the previous year. Total harvested area was little changed at 30.71 million hectares.

Related: USDA sees more soybean acres, less corn

“Seeding decisions are expected to be shaped by crop rotation needs, prevailing moisture conditions, anticipated price levels and input costs and availability,” AAFC wrote. “Under current market conditions and based on historical patterns, total seeded area for Canadian field crops is projected to broadly stable year-over-year.”

The agency also forecast yields to return to normal levels in 2026/27 from the unexpected increases in 2025/26. With overall production to decrease, ending stocks have been projected to decline significantly in 2026/27, despite slower exports.

Wheat

• All wheat area was projected to remain relatively steady at 10.94 million hectares. Of that total, durum area is to be 2.46 million hectares versus 2.64 million in 2025/26. Wheat (no durum) is to expand to 8.48 million hectares from nearly 8.30 million in 2025/26.
• AAFC kept all wheat production for the coming crop year at 34.98 million tonnes.
• Wheat ending stocks were kept at 5.700 million tonnes for 2026/27, with those for 2025/26 slipping to 7.35 million.

Canola

• Planted canola area for 2026/27 stayed at January’s 8.92 million hectares, up from 8.75 million the previous year.
• However, yields are to drop to 2.17 tonnes per hectare from 2.51 in 2025/26. That’s to lower production by almost 12 per cent at 19.20 million tonnes.
• AAFC kept its call for 2025/26 canola exports to 8.20 million tonnes and those for 2026/27 remained at 7.50 million.
• Canola ending stocks were nudged up by 10,000 tonnes each for 2025/26 at 2.76 million tonnes and 2026/27 at 1.66 million tonnes.

Barley/Oats

• AAFC kept its estimate on planted barley area for this spring at 2.64 million hectares, up from 2.48 million last year. Ending stocks are to drop from 1.60 million tonnes in 2025/26 to 900,000 in 2026/27.
• The agency also maintained planted oat area for 2026/27 at 1.24 million hectares, slightly higher from the year before. Based on a more average yield of 3.43 t/ha. production is to drop to 3.55 million tonnes from last year’s 3.92 million.

Soybeans/Corn

• There were no changes in AAFC’s corn data for 2026/27, and it was much the same for soybeans. The agency raised 2026/27 soybean ending stocks to 743,000 tonnes from 650,000 last month.

Peas/Lentils

• AAFC kept most of its January pulse numbers in its February report.
• Pea production stayed at 2.85 million tonnes for 2026/27, as did lentils at 2.25 million tonnes. In 2025/26 peas came in at 3.93 million tonnes with lentils at 3.36 million.
• Ending stocks were bumped up from January, with dry peas now at 845,000 tonnes and lentils at 1.57 million.

1 hectare = 2.47 acres

The post Minor tweaks in AAFC supply and demand report appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

At least four meetings will be held.

The deputy minister of agriculture, Lawrence Hanson, and two assistants were the first witnesses to appear.

Hanson said as part of the comprehensive expenditure review across government, his department had to find $154.7 million in savings by 2028-29. Those savings are occurring across the department, but the coming changes to research operations have hit particularly hard.

WHY IT MATTERS: Public research is seen as critical to enhancing Canada’s productivity and efficiency throughout agriculture and all farm organizations have criticized the decision.

Hanson said the department’s operating budget is about $800 million annually, and science and research facilities account for about $300 million of that. In turn, $90 million of the $300 million is spent on corporate support, including maintenance and utilities associated with running 20 research centres and 25 satellite centres.

Most efficient use of funds

Over time, the facilities have required more upkeep.

“It was determined it would be a much more efficient use of funds to consolidate science efforts in fewer facilities and priorize science efforts that are most core to the department’s mandate, rather than diverting more and more resources to operational costs and upkeep,” Hanson said.

Thus the decision was made to close Quebec City, Guelph, Ont., and Lacombe, Alta., and four satellite farms at Scott and Indian Head in Saskatchewan, Portage la Prairie, Man., and Nappan, N.S.

He said 27 research scientists will not stay in their current location or be offered an equivalent position elsewhere. The federal government will remain the largest agricultural research organization in the country, he added, and every province will have at least one centre.

Regina-Qu’Appelle Conservative MP Andrew Scheer attended the meeting and said he was there to fight for the Indian Head farm, which employs 30 full-time employees and more during the summer.

Alain Legace, assistant deputy minister of corporate management, said the total operating cost for Indian Head is $3.8 million a year. Costs will continue because the divestiture will take years, he said.

Scheer asked if the department had assessed whether costs could be reduced and still keep the site open.

Hanson said the question isn’t whether the site could remain viable with more investment.

“The answer is, we have decided that the greatest level of savings and efficiency could come by consolidating our efforts elsewhere,” he said.

Some of the Indian Head research is to be moved to Outlook, Sask., where the federal government is a partner at the irrigation centre.

MPs pointed out that there are various soil types across the country, and research conducted at one site won’t necessarily fit elsewhere.

Andrew Goldstein, associate assistant deputy minister in the science and technology branch, said the department is aware of the differences, but with four sites in Saskatchewan remaining, it believes it can “generate sufficient diversity to continue our programs.”

Government spending criticized

Scheer and others criticized previous government spending of $8.5 million on a cricket farm and $8.2 million on a low-carbon rice program in Vietnam.

And some noted that a government Scheer was part of had cut the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration and the Shelterbelt Centre at Indian Head about a dozen years ago.

Bloc Quebecois MP Sebastien Lemire said his region was affected during the 2012 cuts by the former Stephen Harper government, and his party is against the latest cuts.

Blaine Calkins, the Alberta Conservative MP for Ponoka-Didsbury, which includes the Lacombe Research Centre, said he hasn’t heard from anyone who thinks closing the centre is a good idea. He said the cuts are coming at the expense of producers and asked if the decision is reversible.

“We are not reconsidering this decision,” Hanson responded.

“We do believe that there are other people we can partner with and other universities and move some of this work elsewhere.”

Legace said it will take 12 months to wind down scientific activity. After that, the property will be divested following a Treasury Board process that requires it to be offered first to other government departments, then provincial and territorial governments and then municipalities and First Nations.

The officials said they could not guarantee any of the land would remain agricultural.

The post Agriculture department officials address research cuts; to hold emergency study appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

“Transparency is essential when decisions affect the foundation of Canada’s agricultural research system,” said GGC chair Scott Hepworth in a Friday news release.

WHY IT MATTERS: In recent weeks, AAFC has confirmed it will be cutting 665 jobs and closing seven research centres across Canada — moves that have drawn broad criticism from the industry.

GGC said the cuts required impact assessments and will hinder the ability to assess downstream consequences on Canadian agriculture. It called for immediate clarity on affected programs, facilities and research capacity.

“Without clear disclosure of what research capacity is being reduced or eliminated, the sector cannot understand the long-term risks to production and competitiveness,” Hepworth added. “It must be clear what capacity is being lost, where, and with what consequences.”

GGC criticized the department for not providing more transparency around the reasoning for the cuts and for citing personnel confidentiality as their reasoning.

“Personnel confidentiality is not a barrier to clarity on program impacts,” Hepworth said, adding transparency about the affected programs is “both possible and necessary.”

In a previous statement to Glacier FarmMedia, a representative from AAFC cited “a careful review of the department’s science activities, sector priorities, capacity, and infrastructure” for the decisions.

The statement also said the choices “position AAFC to sustain strong scientific capacity, improve efficiency, and concentrate resources where they will continue to generate scientific, economic and environmental benefits.”

GGC also raised concerns about the potential impacts the cuts will have on research capacity, regional expertise and innovation in the sector.

The post Grain Growers of Canada calls for clarity, transparency on AAFC research cuts appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Each facility has its own important story to tell about the benefits they provide to the public good, as do the researchers themselves. Additionally, esteemed wheat breeder, Richard Cuthbert’s recent resignation from Swift Current, Sask., research station, leaves a gap that needs to filled by spring if we want to see improved varieties of wheat continue to excel.

We don’t fully know the effect of all these cuts, but this is one of those times when farmers and citizens need to speak up loudly and demand accountability. It’s not enough to simply shrug shoulders and take the pessimistic “there’s nothing more we can do” approach. That drags us into a complacent and passive individualism; the malaise that got us here in the first place; the mindset that expects cuts to be the future norm.

It would also be a mistake to accept that much-touted “privatization” is the only path forward. The realities are that several Canadian private companies pay a fee for use of these facilities and collectively gain from this work.

Most farmers see the benefit of these government institutions. The results on our farms are evident. We see the creation of new varieties, combined with the growth and nurturing of long-term researchers in the public system, as necessary to combat future challenges in food productivity while ensuring the effectiveness of Canadian farmers, globally and locally.

One major problem is that we track the productivity gains from breeding efforts on a bushel-per-acre basis, but we don’t put the same efforts into tracking other benefits of public plant breeding. Simply put, the work is supported, but the value of it can be difficult to communicate clearly.

When effort is taken to delve into the economic impact, it is impressive. A major study in Saskatchewan from lead author Richard Gray found the following:

• Taxpayer investments of $370.6 million between 1995 and 2020 resulted in a cumulative benefit to the Canadian economy of $11.8 billion.
• Ever single dollar of wheat investment from governments returned $31 to Canadians. When producer contributions through joint funding efforts were factored in, the return rose to over $70.

The study concluded “… these breeding programs should be supported by all parties with the aim of enhancing capacity and sustaining these effective relationships over time.”

This is the sort of information we should be communicating to decision-makers in government, especially at a time where Canada’s sovereign economic interests are at the forefront of the policy agenda. Agriculture and food related research should not be a casualty of mere bean counting (literally).

One critical loss will be the organic program lead by Dr. Myriam Fernandez in Swift Current. It’s been one of the few long-term research programs that addresses the production issues of organic and regenerative farmers in Canada. Just as government is asking farmers to use more climate mitigation practices and improve their environmental footprint, it has slashed one of the few research programs aimed at doing so effectively.

There is much we do not yet know about the microbial activity of soil and how we might leverage those natural activities for our agricultural purposes. This work is knowledge-based. It’s free of bias for profit. It’s extremely hard to replace. I fear these moves similar to the agricultural equivalent of scrapping the Avro Arrow in the 1950s, when Canada was a world leader in aerospace design.

To clarify, these cuts:

1. Ignore important production and unbiased knowledge-based issues because there’s no way to reasonably replace or monetize that work (low return).
2. Fuel the fire for profit motive mechanisms like expensive end point royalties that funnel farmer dollars into hungry investor pockets.
3. Introduce a vacuum to future gains through the loss of programs and researchers that require year in and year out experimental work. Private companies will not pick up that tab. The nation suffers.

The results are like cutting off a farmer’s leg, offering them a shiny prosthetic one, and then charging them a subscription to use it.

We must ensure the decision-makers in Ottawa understand the true cost of this decision, and lobby them to reverse it.

Farmers, it’s time to write those letters. Start with your local MP, and work your way up.

Dean Harder farms near Lowe Farm, Manitoba. He’s a member of the Manitoba regional council of the National Farmers’ Union, and a former director of what was the Manitoba Wheat and Barley Growers Association.

The post Canadian government got it wrong on public plant breeding appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

“Everybody understood that the cuts would be coming because of the way things are, but what we’re disappointed in is that it appears as though the cuts were made without much consideration of industry priority,” said Reynold Bergen, science director with the Beef Cattle Research Council.

WHY IT MATTERS: The drastic cut to agricultural research will have a long-lasting impact on Canada’s ability to remain competitive in the global agriculture industry.

“We weren’t consulted, but we were kind of expecting that the votes of confidence we have put in in the past based on past funding decisions or funding investments in these programs would indicate where our priorities are and those priorities don’t line up with the decisions that have been made here.”

Breanne Tidemann, a weed scientist at Lacombe, wrote on X: “I’ve always shared about my research on here so a brief update on my situation. My position in Lacombe has been terminated as the station is being closed. I have been given an opportunity to stay with AAFC if I relocate. My family and I are weighing our options.”

There are no imminent site closures and the wind-down of scientific operations could take up to 12 months, said the department.

Bergen said the news has caused uncertainty.

“We don’t totally know what the impact is going to be on cattle or beef or forage research because we don’t know which researchers have been eliminated and might be relocated to other sites,” he said.

“It’s going to be some mix of both, but we don’t know how many and we don’t know who.”

Lacombe County said in a social media post that it was deeply disappointed with the federal government’s decision to close the centre, which has been in operation for 50 years, and called on Ottawa to pause the move.

The county said more than 100 centre employees and their families have been affected by the closure, as well as industry partners.

Lacombe was a major site for cow-calf forage and grazing research, as well as meat science, grading research and food safety.

“This is going to be a big loss. We just don’t exactly know what is being lost yet,” said Bergen.

The loss of Lacombe will be a hit to the industry, but the Quebec City research station will be also be a loss because it has been the site of extensive forage breeding.

“Quebec’s a long way away, but the varieties they develop there go all across the country,” he said.

• READ MORE: Beef industry weighs in on AAFC research cuts

Bergen said time will tell how the closure of the research stations will affect agriculture across Canada.

“The insidious part about cutting research is that it’s like a long hose. Think of water running out of a long hose, and you shut the tap off. Water keeps running until it doesn’t. With research, there’s such a long fuse on research that it might be 20 years before you start to wonder, ‘Well, how come nothing’s improving here?’ And it’s because of the cuts that were made so long ago.”

Ken Coles, executive director of Farming Smarter, called the Lacombe closure a “catastrophe.”

“I think it’s a shame and disgrace as a country that we’re not supporting one of the foundations of our country in an appropriate manner that will keep the industry competitive and vibrant on the world stage.”

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