It comes in the aftermath of the provincial government investing $500,000 in Farming Smarter last summer to purchase equipment, aiding the organization in doubling its potato agronomy research projects in 2025.

“Over the last two years, we have probably spent about $1.2 million in equipment that allows us to really delve into the high-value irrigated row crop industry. We all know it’s an amazing industry, but there sure is not a lot of research to support such an amazing, economically important industry,” said Ken Coles, executive director of Farming Smarter.

The non-profit Farming Smarter research institute was officially born in 2012, merging from the Southern Alberta Conservation Association and the Southern Applied Research Association.

Those humble beginnings as an association had a budget of $150,000, with Farming Smarter breaking an operating revenue of $3.24 million in 2025. Of that, 91 per cent goes to research, innovation, and knowledge extension.

“On the expense side, we spent $2.83 million on operations, but because of that large capital expenditure, we definitely put a good chunk of effort into building our resources,” said Coles.

Research acres have grown from 267 in 2024, to just over 500 acres in 2026, leasing a couple of quarters along Highway 3 near Coaldale, to form a strong presence in the crucial southern Alberta agriculture corridor. Plots can be found in the Lethbridge, Stirling, Barons, Coaldale and Bow Island areas.

The small full-time staff of 11 also have summer students to rely on, as 119 students have walked through the door since 2012.

“When we dug in informally and looked at the capacity that we’ve grown to as an organization, we found out we’re doing twice the amount of field-based agronomy research than all of our post secondaries in Alberta combined,” said Coles, who is guided by a board of directors.

“The work that we’re doing here at Farming Smarter is unmatched in the province. We’ve got a good group of people that are willing to work with us, and I think there’s an opportunity for us to continue to build capacity and and get the support.”

Agriculture has caught the eye of philanthropic foundations in recent years as regenerative become the latest buzz word. The Weston Family Foundation, RBC Tech for Nature and Farmers For Climate Solutions, have supported Farming Smarter alongside a new grant from the Carthy Foundation for environmentally sustainable agriculture.

“It is allowing us to do work we have never done before. It provides us with the flexibility to work on things that are local. Whenever we’re working for research projects, we have to appeal to the entire province, or sometimes to all of Western Canada. So we’re looking continuing our efforts in building more relationships along that front.”

“A lot of about the culture is, let’s try some crazy things, and maybe we can even save you guys from doing something stupid. We call ourselves Farming Smarter, but really this is: ‘Let’s make as many mistakes as we can so that you don’t have to’,” said Coles.

Agriculture generates around $150 billion in Canada, supporting one in nine jobs, and is a top-10 exporter in the world of its goods. As the non-profit Farmer Smarter continues to expand, the executive director hopes what he called the catastrophic closing of seven research farms across the nation by the federal government will serve as a springboard.

For Coles, advocacy is needed now more than ever in the importance the type of work his organization and those like it are doing in helping power agriculture.

“While I do understand the need to cut back in bureaucracy and the size of government, what we’re cutting here is irreplaceable, and we’re cutting all the rural region,” said Coles.

“Some could argue that, ‘Oh, well, you guys can pick up the slack’. That’s not true, because the only way we’re successful is to partner with others across the country, to share the expertise. We’re really general, and we need those experts. All those agronomy battles, kochia is the number-one problem we heard from everybody. You just lost half of the weed scientists in the province, and that’s not a good thing.”

Farming Smarter collaborates with numerous colleges, universities, provincial and federal agencies, and private research associations across western Canada on many projects.

The organization also helps train industry and has conducted product demonstrations for Syngenta, BASF, Bayer, Valent, FMC, NuFarm, SeCan, and SeedNet among many others.

The post From deep cuts to double growth: Farming Smarter defies research crisis appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

“We’re watching this, but we’re not necessarily complaining about it,” said Ryan Copithorne, president of the Western Stock Growers’ Association.

WHY IT MATTERS: The potential changes to Alberta’s MAS could have a big financial impact on Alberta’s farmers and rural municipalities.

“There are some groups that are out and out hostile over it right now, and I’m more of the opinion that maybe there was some bad process, but we need to keep an eye on it and make sure they do the right thing. So that’s kind of our view on it,” said Copithorne, a ranch consultant who farms near Jumping Pound.

The MAS could affect property rights, weaken lease protection and result in the potential transfer of industry liabilities onto private land.

Copithorne said there are about 471,000 wells in Alberta, and two thirds of them are in decline, aging or becoming mature assets.

“The government realized that they have a problem with this, because a lot of these wells are uneconomic. There are cases in the province where oil companies are transferring the liability or trying to get out from underneath these things, because there’s a reclamation liability on them,” he said.

Copithorne said some landowners and municipalities are not getting paid, and distrust has grown between landowners, oil companies and dissatisfaction with the government over this.

“Once the government realized they had a problem, Danielle Smith engaged an industry insider, David Yager, to formulate some recommendations on how to fix this problem, and so he brought together 97 entities into working groups he created,” said Copithorne.

There were six working groups, each tackling a different topic. For example, one topic was liability; another topic was what to do with orphan wells.

Photo: File

All the groups were engaged to come up with a strategy of what to do with the mature assets in the province. The consultation was invite-only. Some of the stakeholders, like landholders and representatives from the cattle industry weren’t invited when they should have been at the table, said Copithorne.

“There were a lot of government organizations, a lot of industry organizations, but there were some noticeable gaps. The rural municipalities pointed out that cattle industry groups weren’t invited, and yet cattle producers are some of the largest landholders in the province, and they weren’t invited to participate,” he said.

The table was skewed to the oil industry and not as much to the other stakeholders. This was one of the concerns brought up by the Surface Rights Federation and the Rural Municipalities of Alberta.

“The stakeholders were allowed to participate in one or two groups, maybe up to three. At the end of the process, there was no cross pollination between these groups. If you were a landholder, representing landholders, you were only allowed to have input on one or two topics, when all six topics affect you. It was a siloed approach,” he said.

“There was an underrepresentation of landholders at the working group, and there was no public consultation on it. There might be public consultation coming. I’m not sure, but at this point, there is none,” he said.

Copithorne said the recommendations from the working groups are just that and are not policy yet.

“But as stakeholders and landholders, we’re keeping an eye on it to ensure that there is a good process before it becomes policy,” he said.

Copithorne said the recommendations do affect property rights, because some of the recommendations were designed to make mature assets more appealing for oil companies to re-stimulate activity.

Mature assets are being retired, or become delinquent or inactive, because overhead costs are too high. The overheads include taxes, fees, and regulations.

Landowners’ rights can be affected if regulations are eased in certain areas.

“There was talk about making it easier for oil companies, so they wouldn’t be abandoning these sites and trying to stimulate activity on them, which I’m in favour of. I think most people are in favour of cutting red tape. It’s a matter of making sure that the right red tape is cut, and the wrong one isn’t cut. We can’t be loosening regulations on reclamation. And we can’t be loosening the regulatory burden of liability. Those things need to be sacrosanct,” he said.

In some cases, oil companies are not using the wells because of the municipal tax burden, he said.

This was a sticking point for the municipalities, because they said the information used for these statements was inaccurate.

“They didn’t feel like there was proper data used for the analysis,” said Copithorne. Municipalities were concerned about the lowering of municipal taxes or making things more tax affordable on these mature asset wells. Municipalities are taking the hit on declining wells. The liability and expense is likely to be passed on to landholders, taxpayers and municipalities.

Right now, there are $250 million in unpaid taxes owed to municipalities on account of delinquent or unpaid municipal taxes on these mature assets.

Repurposing wells into other uses could also have an effect.

“If they can come up with innovative ideas of what they can do with some of these old oil wells, that’s fine. The problem is, as a landholder, when you switch the use, suddenly, you’re talking about a whole different set of liabilities and a whole different set of rights,” he said.

For example, if an oil company stops paying a landholder, that landholder can be protected by Section 36, which is the Surface Rights Act, said Copithorne. This act allows landholders to receive compensation if the oil company stops paying them. Orphan well funds can compensate landholders if an oil company goes delinquent or doesn’t pay.

However, if the land use is changed to something like geothermal, the new technology does not follow the same set of rules as oil companies.

“We don’t know what the liabilities are. If there’s a recommendation just to allow these licenses to transfer into different uses, like for renewable energies, what is going to be the new set of liabilities?” said Copithorne.

“We need to make sure landholders are aware of that and are part of the process,” he said.

There’s been an increase in the number of non-paying or inactive operations because of low oil and gas prices.

“When you get low oil and gas prices, a lot of these wells become uneconomic,” he said.

The oil companies want to get rid of these wells, and they sell the well to another company.

“Often that gets transferred to some insolvent company, or lost company and all of a sudden surface rights aren’t being paid,” he said.

“I think if you get into a better marketplace, I think a lot of these wells would come back into production. But we’re suffering low economics right now,” he said.

There is a lot of red tape and regulatory costs when dealing with orphan wells.

Landholders should stay informed of what is happening, because everything is just a recommendation right now.

“We applaud the government for wanting to come up with a strategy on these mature assets. It’s the right thing to do. But there were question marks from some of the stakeholders about the process, and there were some question marks about the outcomes and the way recommendations came about. We need to make sure that before these recommendations turn to policy, that they’ve addressed the concerns of stakeholders,” he said.

Copithorne said people should also stay informed about their rights under the Surface Rights Act, as well as the Expropriation Act. These acts protect landholders from government overreach.

The Alberta Surface Rights Federation, the Rural Municipalities of Alberta and cattle industry groups such as Western Stock Growers’ Association are now following the mature assets strategy and making sure their views are being represented.

“I would encourage people to be careful of the repurposing aspect of these recommendations,” said Copithorne.

Landholders will need to be part of the process if that happens, he said.

If a landholder has oil and gas activity and mature assets on their property, they should document everything that happens, including payments, and activity in case they must make a claim.

“We also encourage liability funds or polluter pays principles, so if oil and gas companies are going to drill new wells or build new activity, then they’ve got funds set aside in case things go wrong,” he said.

Copithorne said landholders should keep a vigilant eye on the erosion of property rights.

The post Recommendations in the mature assets strategy could cause potential problems for landholders appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

The program is called Ag Literacy for Healthier People and Planet, and will “help build understanding about the complexities of the agricultural system” and the role food plays in healthy people and planet, the university said in a news release yesterday.

The university’s Simpson Centre for Food and Agricultural Policy will research and do outreach on the food system over about five years “to foster a deeper understanding of the food choices we make and inform the design of agricultural policies,” it said.

This will be done in partnership with 13 Canadian universities and Stanford University in the U.S.

“The program will deliver a variety of written, digital resources to educate the public on controversial issues in the food system like the use of GMO, pesticides, and food labels, also surveying consumer knowledge, and actively engaging with citizens,” the news release said.

“The program is designed to reach a broad range of audiences, including formal stakeholders such as research, industry, and government, as well as informal audiences such as consumers and citizens,” said Guillaume Lhermie, director of the Simpson Centre.

“We are particularly focused on engaging young adults and teenagers who are active on social media and eager to participate in shaping the future of food systems.

The post BMO funds University of Calgary ag literacy program appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Some grain industry stakeholders say that reprieve is not helpful.

“We were expecting a strike to happen on May 22, and then the minister of labour instructed the Canadian Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) to take a look at maintenance of activities and what should remain essential,” said Wade Sobkowich, executive director for the Western Grain Elevator Association (WGEA).

There can be no strike or lockout before the CIRB issues a decision.

Why it matters: The labour dispute between Canada’s railways and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference threatens to disrupt grain transportation.

Sobkowich worries that the grain industry could be without service for a longer period than if the CIRB had not been asked for a ruling.

In a June 11 release, CN Rail echoed that sentiment. The railway said uncertainty about the timing of a labour disruption hurts its employees and the Canadian economy. The request by the minister of labour is adding to that uncertainty, the company said.

Lingering dispute

The two sides have been negotiating since November 2023, a month before the previous collective agreement expired. Talks have stalled over wages, scheduling and fatigue management. At the beginning of May, the Teamsters voted overwhelmingly for strike action. Since then, the two sides appear no closer to settling a contract.

Attempts were made in June to close the gap and CN’s June 6 offer of binding arbitration was rejected by the union.

On June 7, the Teamsters offered the possibility of staggered strikes to lessen the impact of work stoppages, which the railways rejected. On its bargaining update page, CN said such measures would risk extending the strike.

“It is like suffering death by a thousand cuts,” the rebuttal read.

The union initiated another vote June 14 to renew the strike mandate, which lasts only 60 days. The vote is expected to conclude June 29, the day before the union’s existing mandate expires.

There is no indication of when the CIRB will make its recommendations and a strike could be called as soon as 72 hours after it releases a decision. However, in a June 14 update on its website, Canadian Pacific Kansas City said that, based on precedent, it is unlikely the Teamsters would be in a position to strike before mid-July.

Grain uncertainty

Grain industry players say a strike could prove devastating.

“It will be terrible for grain shipping,” said Bruce McFadden, director of research and analysis for Quorum Corporation, which monitors Canada’s grain shipping industry. It will affect more than grain movement, he added.

“It will impact all segments of the industry. We have customers overseas that need a reliable supply of Canadian products and, if they can’t count on it, there’s always a risk of them going to other places.

”It’s a concern that they will not come back to Canada in the same way if they see constant disruptions in the Canadian operations.”

The WGEA is asking the CIRB to consider grain shipments to be essential “for the maintenance and preservation of Canada’s domestic food and feed supply and global food security,” Sobkowich said, adding that grain shipping was deemed essential during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If it was essential for Canadians during the pandemic, it should be essential now.”

Any suggestion of splitting networks into essential and non-essential service is untenable, according to the railways.

“The railways have said they can’t carve out just a portion of their network like that,” said Sobkowich.

Without that essential designation, grain movement will grind to a halt in Canada if the strike proceeds.

“It will stop all rail movements of grain on both railways at the same time. There is no Plan B,” Sobkowich said. “The only thing grain elevators and all processors can do is start slowing down sales and preparing for a stoppage in the movement of grain.”

The situation punctuates the WGEA’s long-standing criticism about lack of competition in grain transportation, he added.

Sobkowich said a quick decision is critical for the Canadian grain sector because the harvest season begins in August.

“It is crucial that the rail work stoppage be over and the labour agreements resolved by then.”

The post Rail strike still looms as holdup stretches on appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.