The two farm groups are using a platform called ElectionBuddy, which its developers say is a secure method for member-based organizations to conduct elections.

For Alberta Wheat, go to albertawheatvotes.com (opens as a secure ElectionBuddy link) or albertabarleyvotes.com (opens as a secure ElectionBuddy link) for Alberta Barley.

The registration process requires the farm’s name or the producer’s business number. Voting is open until Nov. 6.

Alberta Wheat has elections in six regions, including two director spots, one director-at-large position, and nearly two dozen delegate spots. Alberta Barley has elections for two directors and three regional reps in both Regions 2 and 4.

The post Alberta farm groups using online voting appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Alberta Barley passed a similar resolution at its AGM in December.

The exploratory process shouldn’t be clouded by turf wars on the employee side of things since the two organizations actually share all of their staff, and have since January 2018. Sharing staff saved farmers $410,000 for fiscal year 2018-19 — money that can instead be spent on research, advocacy and extension to increase producer profitability.

In November, I attended a regional meeting for the two organizations where Tom Steve, general manager for both, acknowledged the cost savings associated with amalgamating the governance structure won’t be as noticeable, since board function is more of a variable cost than a fixed overhead cost.

Our provincial commissions including wheat, barley, pulses and canola should — and do — work together and speak with one voice on the issues that the producers of these crops have in common, both to be more effective and to save money. I believe the sharing of staff between Alberta Wheat and Alberta Barley is a great example of this.

So is Team Alberta — the name given to the shared government lobby efforts of the two cereal commissions as well as Alberta Pulse and Alberta Canola. Staff and board members from all four organizations develop policy and response to government activities, and travel together to present these views in both Edmonton and Ottawa.

FarmTech, CanolaPalooza, grain-grading courses, and many other extension events are another example of the four commissions working together to increase producer knowledge and improve farming practices.

So as positive as I feel about the commissions working together, you might be surprised to read that I am not in favour of merging these commissions — I’m even a little surprised myself that I feel this way.

My concern mainly is with diversity of voice and representation on the boards. Right now there are 11 board members for Alberta Wheat and nine for Alberta Barley. That’s 20 minds and voices to contribute to improving the world for wheat and barley farmers in Alberta. A joint commission would knock that number down considerably.

If Alberta farmers went even further down the road and formed an all-crops commission — as is under serious consideration in Manitoba — we would go from 44 representatives on four commissions to much fewer.

I know it can be difficult for commodity boards to attract and retain elected representatives. However, I think reducing the number of leadership positions is the wrong approach.

Instead, we need to work to make the roles more appealing and perhaps less overwhelming to a more diverse swath of farmers. If we have fewer board seats, we will have fewer opportunities to draw new and under-represented voices to the forefront of farm policy.

I also believe that the more crops an organization represents the more removed farmers will become from making decisions on the agricultural issues of the day.

Directors on the four existing commissions can drill down into matters of trade, agronomy, legislation and research related to their respective crop type. If the same directors now need a working knowledge of multiple crop types, their knowledge will necessarily become higher level and they will become more dependent on staff expertise.

Now, I’m not proposing that commissions should have ‘working boards’ — I believe they should still function as a policy board with the staff doing the implementation.

But I believe policy is best set by those who have a deep knowledge of the issues. And I’m not disparaging the wealth of experience that commission staff bring to farm groups. We would be lost without them. However, decisions still need to be made by those with a vested interest in the outcomes — farmers. The bigger the portfolio, the more bureaucratic the organization will become by necessity.

Manitoba is proposing to deal with some of these challenges by having committees represent different crops. This might be a good solution for that province’s farmers, but I don’t think it’s practical in Alberta where the growing region stretches from High Level to the U.S. border.

It’s great to see the four Alberta crop commissions in a healthy place both financially and culturally.

They are working together for the good of Alberta farmers and I heartily endorse further exploration of ways they can collaborate to conserve resources and produce better results.

However, I don’t think we would be well served by reducing the number of commissions or board seats we currently have. We need to maintain all the opportunities we have for the grassroots voice of producers to be heard.

– Sarah Hoffmann is a grain farmer and manager of Alect Seeds near Three Hills.

The post Opinion: On cereal commissions. Collaboration? Yes. Amalgamation? No appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Alberta Wheat is giving $2.6 million, part of a $25-million effort called the Canadian National Wheat Cluster.

The initiative by Ottawa and several ag groups is funding 22 variety development, pathology, agronomy and pre-breeding projects.

Among the recipients are three federal researchers working in Alberta: Robert Graf (CWRW cultivars), Harpinder Randhawa (CPSR cultivars and also CWSWS cultivars), and Kelly Turkington (management options to lessen the impact of fusarium).

Meanwhile Alberta Barley is giving $900,000 as part of the $10.2-million National Barley Research Cluster.

Turkington has a trio of projects receiving funding along with research by Breanne Tidemann of AAFC Lacombe and Ruud Zijlstra of the U of Alberta.

The post Research clusters fund host of projects appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

And the Valleyview-area farmer is not alone.

Alberta producers have reported 967,569 unharvested acres to Agricultural Financial Services Corporation (AFSC) — a massive area that would have cost those farmers hundreds of millions of dollars to seed. And the financial pain doesn’t end there.

“I’m really concerned with the issue because by the time it gets dry enough to harvest, are we going to have a big enough window to put another crop in again?” asked Tollefson, who crops 1,700 acres on his mixed farm.

“We’re really reliant on Mother Nature for the spring because if it ends up being a wet, late spring, we’re just not going to get a crop in.

“The stuff we did harvest, we got ruts from one end to the other and it’s going to be a matter of going in and direct seeding into it. We have issues on how we’re going to deal with that too, before we can put a crop in.”

Tollefson asked AFSC to do an assessment of his unharvested crops so he could apply to his municipality for a burning permit.  (He hopes that would allow him, after dealing with the ruts, to get started seeding without too much delay.)

“It would be nice if they could do something at this point,” said Tollefson, adding even the grain he harvested in the fall was in bad shape. “We actually delivered wheat that was combined in September, and it got downgraded to a feed.”

But he’ll also need a dry — but not too dry — start to spring.

That’s going to be a huge problem, said Greg Porozni, a Willingdon-area farmer and Alberta Wheat Commission director.

Straw dries out very quickly, and if there are hot, dry winds in April and a fire gets out of control, it’s extremely hard to stop, he noted.

“It’s very risky and dangerous because you can lose (farm) yards,” he said. “If it stays with this limited snow cover, there will be no burning permits issued.

“I’m hearing that the County of Lamont has already suspended burning permits. With direct-seeded fields and stubble, you can’t just afford to have a wildfire get loose on you and burn the whole community. I really don’t think that burning is going to be an option.”

The impact

The financial impact from a late start to seeding won’t be known until after the next harvest, but the impact from last year’s incomplete harvest is now coming into view.

As of March 5, AFSC had assessed 1,708 claims covering 616,412 unharvested acres and issued $29,543,920 in payouts. The agency does not track payments on a per-acre basis and they depend on “variations in elected crop types, elected coverage levels, yields, and grades,” AFSC spokesperson Mustafa Eric said in an email statement.

However, given the high cost of putting in a crop, many producers will take a major financial hit.

Each year, Alberta Agriculture and Forestry estimates production costs by soil zone for all of the major crops. The costs include seed, chemicals, trucking, crop insurance, repairs, loan interest, and a small amount for labour (but not depreciation). The 2016 estimates for feed barley ranged from $176 to $233 per acre (depending on the soil zone) while canola production costs ranged from $230 to $323 per acre.

Government needs to be forgiving when it comes to settling claims, said Tollefson who is a director with the Alberta Barley Commission. He and other crop commission reps have raised the matter with officials, including Agriculture Minister Oneil Carlier.

“The comments from some adjusters were that there was value in some crop still,” he said. “We can bale it up and it can be used as feed. But when we bought the crop insurance on it, we insured it as a crop.”

Moreover, downgraded crop harvested in the spring will further flood a feed market awash in poor-quality grain, said Porozni.

“It’s already soft. Feed wheat is low and barley is even lower,” he said. “Once there’s pressure for harvest in April, farmers are going to want to get cash flow. They’re going to want to move their feed if they can off the combine and the price is going to get depressed even further.

“There’s no question there will be some loss. Not only a yield loss to the deer and mice, but also price deterioration due to market supply and demand and an oversupply of feed in the spring.”

What’s needed

Although there are unharvested crops in most of the province (the exception being the south), some producers — like Tollefson — have been hit especially hard while others were spared.

“Ten miles from me, they were able to combine and pick up on the fly and it’s really localized in certain areas,” he said. “There are pockets that are quite severe.”

In his area northeast of Edmonton, Porozni estimates about 90 per cent of farmers will have harvesting to do in the spring.

“It’s going to be a very hectic April and let’s hope it’s an early April, so that everybody can get things done on time, as early as they can and then start doing field work,” he said.

But it will take a massive effort by AFSC to finish assessing all the unharvested acres, he said.

“They have to make sure that they’re on track and get all the assessments done,” he said. “If farmers can get out there, they’re going to go. Time is everything on the farm, and they’re going to be ready to go if they can.”

Because of the unusually high number of claims, farm inspectors have been assigned to high-demand areas to speed up the process, and will continue until all claims have been investigated, said Eric.

Tollefson, who said he’s talked to a lot of worried producers, shares those concerns. An adjuster has come by his place but he hasn’t received any compensation so far.

But his main concern right now is that a slow assessment will delay dealing with last year’s crop, which in turn will delay seeding and increase the risk of another harvest wreck.

Losing two crops in a row would be a nightmare and “we’ve basically lost one,” he said.

The post The Big Wreck: One million unharvested acres appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

“We’ve been happy with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada,” said Jason Lenz, chair of Alberta Barley Commission.

The federal government has been hiring new scientists and replacing retired ones, he said.

“In our mind, that’s a real positive and something we were uncertain about even a year ago,” said Lenz, who farms barley, canola, wheat, and raises cattle north of Sylvan Lake. “For the most part, they have started to live up to the promises that they have told us, that they were aware of all these retiring researchers and they would be replacing them as soon as possible.”

The barley commission met with federal officials and told them it is interested in renewing agreements with its Lacombe research station, as well as Alberta Agriculture and Forestry’s Field Crop Development Centre there.

“We’re actively involved in that right now and we expect that we’re going to sign an agreement of some sort likely very similar to what we’ve had in the past,” said Lenz.

There seems to be a good understanding in Ottawa that Canadian research on cereals truly pays dividends for Prairie farmers, he said.

“We are getting good messages coming back from the federal side of things,” said Lenz. “It’s the provincial side we’re really struggling with. We’re not being told what their ideas are, and what they could be proposing to come.

“The problem with that uncertainty and not being able to fund research is that once that research stops and there’s a gap, it’s really hard and really expensive to ramp it up again and then have it continue on because a lot of the projects that we fund could be three- to five-year projects.”

The Alberta Wheat Commission is also seeing positive signs of commitment from the federal government. Between Ottawa and producer groups, more than $25 million is contributed to wheat research clusters.

“For every dollar invested by the public, there is a dollar invested by the industry,” said Terry Young, Alberta Wheat Commission director and chair of the commission’s research committee. “Whatever the commodity is — whether it is barley, wheat, canola, or pulses — there are federal dollars in research. If they decided to pull out, which I don’t think they will, it would make a huge difference to our industry.

“Currently the majority of varieties grown and developed in the public system is the result of AAFC and it has considerable research capacity in terms of trait development, germplasm development, you name it.”

Federal research scientists also concentrate on agronomy, which makes a big difference to growers, added the Lacombe-area farmer, who grows wheat, fababeans, malt barley, and canola.

“I wouldn’t say the majority of wheat research is made up of federal funding, but it’s 50 per cent, probably,” he said. “There are crop commissions all across Western Canada that put funding into wheat research. There are also a few private dollars put in. But it is a major commitment from the feds.”

The private system to fund wheat breeding is not particularly well established, and wouldn’t be able to fill the gap if federal government research funding suddenly dried up, Young added.

“Yes, we can pick up some of the loss capacity, and as time goes on, we probably will be picking up more. But if they all of a sudden decided to cancel their share of wheat breeding, it would have dire consequences.”

If funding was to ever become an issue, commissions would examine and research a variety of different funding models to fill the gap. A current area of concern in Alberta is the Alberta Crop Industry Development Fund, a source of provincial funding, which could shutter its doors April 1, 2018.

“Without that fund being replenished, and in a state of uncertainty, from the barley value chain in Alberta, that’s a huge concern for us,” said Lenz.

The post Farm groups welcome Ottawa’s research funding pledge appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Revenue fell to $4.1 million in the 2015-16 fiscal year from $4.9 million a year earlier, largely due to a drop in checkoffs and less revenue from the AgriInnovation program. But costs also were lower, including a drop of $360,000 for AgriInnovation expenses, $175,000 on salary, benefits, and contractors, and $25,000 for director fees and expenses.

Revenues for its GrainWest magazine were also up but so were expenses.

The financial statements can be found in the 2016 annual report at albertabarley.com.

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“It looks like there’s a lot of crop out there — I’ve heard estimates that this might be the biggest crop ever, and estimates that it might be second only to what we had in 2013,” said Alberta Pulse chair Allison Ammeter, who farms near Sylvan Lake.

“That’s a big issue as long as we’re dealing with the monopolies that we have with CN and CP. As farmers, we might not like government regulations but we recognize that the only way to counteract a monopoly in the industry is with government regulations. You can’t let a market sort itself out.”

That’s also a concern for her husband Mike, who is chair of the Alberta Barley Commission.

Although the Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act — which sets targets for grain movement and penalizes the railways if they don’t meet them — was extended for a year, that’s not a long-term solution, he said.

“This is not an issue that is going away, as long as we export as much as we do,” he said.

The railways say they are better prepared to handle a massive crop than they were three years ago thanks to, among other things, extended sidings and a revised car allocation system worked out with the grain companies.

But both Ammeters pointed to another aspect of rail transport that is rarely discussed — the age of rail grain cars. The current fleet has a lifespan of about 50 years, and is about 40 years old.

“We’re getting to the point where people need to put some serious thought into what we’re going to do to get new rail cars, or we’re going to hit a crisis point,” said Allison. “Every year, there are about 600 to 700 rail cars that cannot be filled because they need repairs so badly.”

Quality concerns

But given the seemingly never-ending rain across much of the province, the Ammeters and their fellow crop commission chairs were also focused on shorter-term issues when reached in late August.

Malt barley growers across the province are not only concerned about the quality of the crop, but also worried that a big stream of downgraded malt being sold as feed would further pressure feed prices, said Mike Ammeter.

“Some guys, I think, have done better than others, but I think that generally in the last two or three weeks, there has been a fair amount of wet weather,” he said. “We need some hot, dry weather. In our area, we’re not excessive, but we’ve got plenty of rain. Now we just need heat.”

It’s the same wish being made by Alberta Wheat chair Kevin Auch and Greg Sears, chair of the Alberta Canola Producers Commission.

“Right now, a lot of farmers are working on getting their crops into the bin,” said Sears, who farms near Sexsmith. “We’ve had huge amounts of rain all over the province, and there could be some challenges getting this harvest in.

“We’re in the situation where anything that is being swathed is immature and it will take awhile to cure in the swath. There were certainly some areas that were hail affected.”

“I have had some lower wheat quality in the past couple of weeks because of the rain,” added Auch, who farms near Carmangay. “My winter wheat could have been harvested earlier than I did, but we had continual rains on it. It’s happening around the province and I know we’re not the only ones.”

Low loonie

With a bumper crop on the horizon and U.S. wheat futures recently hitting a 10-year low, Auch is concerned about price prospects. But there is a silver lining for some, he said.

“If you have higher protein, I suspect you’ll get more for it,” said Auch. “The supply of higher-protein wheat is lower than what it has been because of the higher yields. They kind of go in opposite direction. If you get higher yields, you don’t get the protein.”

Because the global grain and oilseed trade is conducted in American dollars, Canadian farmers have been partially protected from falling prices by the low loonie.

(But “the low Canadian dollar doesn’t shelter us forever, and when you go to buy a machine, you’re paying for it in devalued dollars,” said Auch. “Anything that we buy will be going up in price as well. It holds the prices of our commodities up, but that can catch up to you when you go to buy your inputs or your machines.”

The post Weather woes not the only concern appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Those are among the issues Kevin Bender wants to tackle in his latest off-farm role.

The grain grower from the Sylvan Lake/Bentley area — already vice-chair of the Alberta Wheat Commission and its representative on Cereals Canada — joined the board of the Canadian International Grains Institute last month.

Better known as Cigi, the non-profit facility plays a key role in the marketing of Canadian grain by offering to technical services to millers, bakers, and other buyers as well as organizing and leading ‘Team Canada’ missions abroad.

It also front and centre when grain buyers have a concern, such about as the presence of genetically modified organisms.

“It could be something like soybean dust that is present in the wheat shipment,” said Bender. “If there’s zero tolerance (in the other country), it might be minute, it might be parts per trillion. But that’s still not zero and that’s an issue.”

Cigi is trying to work with other countries to establish a benchmark or acceptable levels on GMOs and pesticide residues in wheat shipments. It is also dealing with complaints about falling gluten strength in the past few years — a problem blamed on three varieties that became popular with Prairie producers.

“The reclassification (of milling wheat classes) has helped address that, but at the same time, wheat acres in those three varieties have been declining,” said Bender. “The problem was correcting itself, but the Canadian Grain Commission took steps to reclassify those varieties as well as several others that didn’t fit.”

Those varieties will be moved into a new class, so growers and seed growers will have time to adopt new varieties into the new Canada Western Red Spring Wheat class as other varieties move into the Canada Northern Harvest Red Spring Wheat class.

But beyond these issues is a larger one.

“The most relevant and current issues are governance and funding,” said Bender. “We’re looking at the new funding model.”

The board will be determining what to do with the Western Canadian Deduction, the 15 cents the Canadian Wheat Board used to deduct from final payment for *each tonne of grain it sold and gave to Cigi. (The agency also receives funding from Ottawa and industry partners.) When the wheat board monopoly ended in 2012, the Alberta Barley Commission took over the program. But that agreement is ending soon.

“It’s up to the industry as to how we want to continue funding,” said Bender. “Do we see value in Cigi and is there enough value to keep funding it or is there some other model? Those are some of the things that we are working through.”

Many producers have told him that there is value in Cigi and want farmers to continue to help fund its work, he added.

*CORRECTION: A previous version of this article stated that the Western Canadian Deduction (checkoff) was 15 cents per bushel rather than 15 cents per tonne. Alberta Farmer regrets the error and any confusion this may have caused.

The post Sylvan Lake farmer joins Cigi board at a critical time appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Has there ever been a husband and wife who were both chairs of farm organizations?

Allison: “I know of commissions where both the husband and wife are involved on the board, but I don’t know of a couple who is both chairs. My board told me they don’t know of another board that has a female chair, so I may be setting a record there, too.”

What sort of commitment does it take to be a chair?

Mike: “I’ve heard some say it can be up to 100 days a year. I don’t know if I can take that many days away from the farm. Allison drives the combine in the fall, but I do all the seeding, spraying and grain hauling, for the most part. So I don’t know if I can pull 100 days out, but I anticipate 40 or 50.”

Allison: “Michael and I both believe in making sure our entire boards are involved and get opportunities. Both of us have the goal that if there are things other members of our board can do equally well, we’d like to share that experience.”

Why are you doing it?

Allison: “I think it’s about serving the industry, serving what we are part of.”

Mike: “I think I attended the first AGM of the barley commission (more than 20 years ago). I’ve always gone to regional meetings, I was a delegate for years, and became a director four years ago. Part of it is that the kids are out of the house, so that’s no longer an issue — and a tip of the hat to anyone who serves on a board and still has a family at home. That’s a huge, huge commitment.”

Allison: “I didn’t even step up onto a board until our last child got a driver’s licence. When the kids were at home, I was chauffeuring all the time, I home-schooled some — there were just other priorities. Now is the time of our life we can give back to this. And we’ve met wonderful people and had cool opportunities. You always get back more than you give. Yes, we’re investing time, but neither of us feel it’s a huge hardship. It’s a huge opportunity.”

What’s your recommendation for someone trying to decide whether to grow more pulses or barley this year?

Allison: “We have a four-year rotation and aim for a quarter of each: barley-wheat-canola-pulses. Rotation is the key to healthy crops. And I don’t mean canola-snow-canola.”

Mike: “It can vary a little. Last year we grew 600 to 700 acres of barley and 400 acres of pulses. So that rotation isn’t a hard-and-fast rule, but it’s pretty close to that.”

True or false? The better you are on social media, the better a leader you are.

Mike: “There’s probably an element of truth to that. My wife is the social media representative of the family. I creep into it a little bit, but I don’t really engage.”

How many times have you tweeted and when was your last one?

Mike (@mikeammeter): “Maybe two. And I couldn’t tell you when.”

Could it have been one tweet — “Coffee in banff” — at the barley commission’s AGM three years ago?

Mike (laughing): “That’s probably it.”

Allison (@AAmmeter; more than 8,000 tweets): “Now that I’ve had time to think about it, can I answer that question? No — I do not believe social media makes you a better leader. Leadership is a combination of a lot of traits, some you’re born with and some you learn. But I think social media helps us get our message out so much better.”

Are you prepared, Mike, to make a commitment to double your number of tweets?

Mike: “I’ve been challenged on that already. Let’s see, I had one three years ago. I think I could do another in the next three years.”

Allison: “I just want to say, Michael, that I didn’t know he was going to ask that. I did not set you up.”

The post It’s a family affair: Two commission chairs in one household appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

“End-users are looking to have a certified or verified supply chain that goes to the farm level,” said Kara Barnes, market development co-ordinator with the Alberta Barley Commission and a best practices specialist with the Barley Council of Canada.

“Just saying that we’re meeting sustainability criteria or indicators is no longer adequate. Customers want proof.”

That’s led to the creation of the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Crops, a forum to advance, report and communicate the sustainability of grain production. The roundtable has been in the planning stages since spring, and will gear its efforts towards specific customers, such as retailers, food-service customers, and feed buyers.

• More from the Alberta Farmer: A new era of watchful food consumer

Each has different interests, said Barnes. Some want farm data that measures “sustainability indicators,” while others are looking for verifiable or certifiable programs which have some sort of mechanism for taking corrective action if the indicators aren’t met.

At present, the grain industry hasn’t decided on one way to prove sustainability.

“We came together in the roundtable to answer that question,” said Barnes. “It depends on what grain market you’re going into. There are grain markets, feed markets, and bioindustrial uses, and they will all have different demands from the end-users.”

The roundtable is looking at different sustainability principles and criteria to develop indicators, and is basing its approach on the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, which was started a year and a half ago, said Jason Lenz, the newly appointed vice-chair of the Alberta Barley Commission.

“Part of what it is about is defining what sustainability is going to mean to the crop sector,” said the Bentley-area producer.

“From my perspective, sustainability isn’t new to farmers. Farmers have been sustainable for a few generations… If you’re not sustainable in what you’re doing, whether it’s farming or any other business, you’re not going to be profitable and your business isn’t going to last very long.”

But tracking sustainability will likely mean a new way of record-keeping on the farm, said Lenz, adding he hopes it will be similar to documenting environmental farm plans, which involves an audit every few years.

“I hope it becomes more of a self-assessment for the individual farmer, with a list of indicators or common practices used in the crop industry, so people can make sure what they’re doing is sustainable,” he said.

There is one big difference between grain and livestock — you can’t put an ear tag on grain kernels, and Lenz, who also raises cattle and hogs, isn’t sure how traceability will continue once his crops hit the elevator.

There are a number of templates being developed to prove crop sustainability and six of these templates were presented at meetings in November, said Allison Ammeter, vice-president of the Alberta Pulse Growers and its rep on the Grain Growers of Canada.

Pulse Canada has spent several years working with the “Canadian Field Print initiative,” a Canadian sister to the model used by several large American companies such as General Mills. The Canola Council of Canada has examined the “Carbon Look-up,” while the Barley Council presented on the Feed Barley Pilot Project.

It’s possible that producers will need to record basic information such as fuel and water use on a year-to-year basis.

The Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Crops has a mandate, mission and vision, but not much more is known about the organization. Three key people who are chairing or steering the organization did not return calls for interviews.

The initial meeting in spring attracted about 60 attendees from almost every province, including federal agriculture officials and reps from companies such as Cargill, BASF, and Syngenta; millers; food retailers such as McCain Foods and Weston Foods; and the Canadian Grains Council. Among the producer groups were the Grain Growers of Canada, the Alberta Wheat Commission, and the Alberta Barley Commission.

Membership will be open to grower associations, value chain members, grain handlers and processors, food manufacturers, and non-governmental organizations. Members of the groups have already developed working committees, and terms of reference. Each working committee is in the process of developing work plans. The next meeting will likely be held in March.

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