Today’s prairie farmers have seen many changes in their crops in the last 15 years thanks to breeding breakthroughs and developing markets. What can their children expect to see by 2025?
Western Producer reporter Sean Pratt talked to experts who expect some new crops and some that will look new because of genetic changes. But most will be the familiar standbys we see today. The big change will be in the mix of crops farmers will seed, the uses for them and where they are grown. New oilseed types will be used for fuel and industrial products, soybeans will push west and north, pulses will expand while cereal area might shrink.
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One potential moneymaking crop of the future for prairie farmers is a yield-sapping weed they contend with today.
Saponaria shows considerable promise as a platform for producing high-value chemicals.
“It’s domesticated cow cockle,” said Eric Johnson, a weed biologist with Agriculture Canada.
Researchers at the federal research farm at Scott, Sask., have been multiplying saponaria for years to use in weed control studies.
“We noted over time that it was relatively easy to grow,” Johnson said. “It actually looked like it could be a crop.”
Their hypothesis was confirmed when a researcher from the National Research Council’s Plant Biotechnology Institute found the plant was rich in saponin, a stabilizer in vaccines that is usually found in a rare plant.
Saponaria also produces fine and uniform starch granules suited for making cosmetics.
Johnson has made progress on saponaria agronomy, figuring out seeding rates and what herbicides to use.
“Interesting enough, it comes from a weed, but weed control is a problem in it. It really doesn’t compete all that well,” he said.
Work is needed on disease control, seed germination and dormancy.
Johnson predicted saponaria could become a niche crop, occupying 20,000 to 50,000 acres by 2025.
An industrial partner was interested in developing the crop, but work is on hold since the company ran into financial difficulties.
Saponaria is a starch crop, while most other promising new crops being investigated for the Prairies are industrial oilseeds.
Ag-West Bio Inc. president Wilf Keller believes industrial oilseeds will occupy one to three million acres of farmland by 2025.
The crops will be grown for high-end industrial purposes such as plastics, polymers, fertilizers, lubricants and jet fuel.
Camelina and Brassica carinata, or Ethiopian mustard, show the most promise. Both can produce a wide variety of industrial products.
Johnson said the new oilseeds will have difficulty competing with canola, but they have built-in drought and heat tolerance allowing them to be grown in the brown soil zone.
He forecasts one million acres of camelina and 300,000 to 500,000 acres of carinata by 2025.
Rex Newkirk, director of research and business development with the Canadian International Grains Institute, is more bullish about carinata than camelina. He predicted 500,000 acres for the two crops, which is on the low side of most expectations.
“It’s not where our brains have been,” he said. “There is not many people that have worked on industrial.”
Crambe, safflower and poppy seed are other potential industrial oil crops.
Keller sees limited potential for biomass energy crops such as switchgrass and miscanthus.
“My reasoning is that the amount of biomass you generate per sq. metre cannot compare with the Gulf of Mexico or the southern (United States).”
The Canadian Triticale Biorefinery Initiative thinks triticale could have three million acres by 2015. But Keller said it will have a tough time competing with corn.
Newkirk is also skeptical.
