Seed grouphas new executive
For the next year, Todd Hyra of SeCan will be the president of the Canadian Seed Trade Association.
Hydra was raised on a mixed farm in Grandview, Man., and has formerly worked at Proven Seed and then as the business manager at SeCan.
He is CSTA’s representative on the federal plant breeders’ rights advisory committee, the seed synergy oversight committee and working groups of the seed and grains value chain roundtables.
New board members include Erin Armstrong, director of industry and regulatory affairs at Canterra Seeds, Denise Schmidt, director of sales at Cibus and returning board member Doug Alderman, vice-president of sales and marketing at Pride Seeds.
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CSTA’s board of directors also includes: Georges Chaussé of La Coop Fédérée; Ellen Sparry of C&M Seeds; Dan Wright of Monsanto Canada; Wayne Gale of Stokes Seeds; Bruce Harrison of Nutrien Ag Solutions; Bob Hart of Sevita International; Duane Johnson of Syngenta Canada; George Lammertsen of Bayer CropScience; Brian Nadeau of Nadeau Seeds; Roger Rotariu of NuFarm; Marty Vermey of Corteva Agriscience and Jim Schweigert of Gro Alliance.
Agronomy research receives funding
The Alberta Wheat Commission announced funding commitments of $175,000 over five years through the Integrated Crop Agronomy Cluster to five research projects aimed at improving crop performance for farmers.
The initiative is aimed at encouraging increased investment in agronomy-focused innovation, which is chaired by the Western Grains Research Foundation and formed by cropping groups across Canada.
The cluster takes a whole-farm approach to regional and national needs and long-term sustainability innovation including soil, water, air and economics.
AWC-funded projects through ICAC investment include:
- $20,000 for monitoring of field crop insect pests in the prairie ecosystem
- $5,000 for the Prairie Crop Disease Monitoring Network
- $50,000 for crop sequence effects on fusarium head blight of cereals
- $50,000 for development of decision support tools for fusarium head blight management in Western Canada
- $50,000 for optimizing systems productivity, resilience and sustainability in the major Canadian ecozones
Cattle producers invest in research
The Saskatchewan Cattlemen’s Association is investing more than $220,000 in five research projects.
The projects are evaluated on their likelihood to enhance the competitiveness and sustainability of Saskatchewan’s cattle producers over the short- and long-term.
One of the projects explores ways to improve the respiratory health of calves by using probiotics in their feed. If successful, the new feed formula will reduce the amount of antibiotics needed to treat sick animals.
Combine adjustmentapp released
A new web-based application has been released by the Canola Council of Canada to help producers with combine adjustments during harvest.
The combine optimization tool was developed by the Prairie Agricultural Machinery Institute and is intended to assist with the process of setting the combine for canola harvest.
Producers can access the tool by smartphone and will go through a process based on the harvesting issue they’re experiencing, such as crop loss, sample quality or productivity, and review the adjustment options most likely to correct the issue. The new tool can be found at canolacalculator.ca.
