VICTORIA MARTINEZ
Senior News Editor

Going into October, effects of this summer’s severe rainfall are being felt across the province.

A preliminary Statistics Canada report predicts a small canola and wheat harvest in the prairies this year. Total wheat production is expected to fall by nearly a fifth compared to last year across the prairies and canola crops are seeing even greater losses.

“We’ve had rainfall amounts four times what we would normally have,” explained University of Saskatchewan soil science professor Jeff Shoenau. Rain makes seeding difficult, and fields, like roadways and construction projects across the province, are susceptible to flooding.

One fourth year agriculture student, Claire Kincaid, described the damage to her family’s crops.

“There was increased disease, [the rainfall] made it hard to get on the field to spray insecticide and delayed harvest,” she said. Like many prairie grain farmers, the crops at her Manitoba farm were mostly cereals.

“Good weather in the last week of September and October was the saving grace,” said Kincaid of her crops. This allowed some salvaging of the harvest.

In Saskatchewan, wet September weather also put a damper on the harvest. Many farms are behind schedule, and an early frost across the prairies could further dampen the final production numbers in November.

Of the prairie provinces, Saskatchewan saw a huge dip in wheat, while Manitoba took an even larger hit to canola production. Although Alberta will likely see a tiny increase in wheat output, Saskatchewan farmers are likely to see a 25.8 per cent drop from last year. Manitoban land will see the largest drop in canola output, at more than a third less than last year, with Saskatchewan close behind.

According to plant sciences department head Bruce Coulman, wheat is seeing a decline in value as canola and other crops are earning farmers more.

“There’s an upward momentum in agricultural commodity due to lack in supply,” Coulman explained, citing droughts in Kazakhstan and Russia that reduced the presence of certain grains on the market.

“Growers are fairly optimistic about production next year, with possibly higher prices,” he predicted. Next year should see an emphasis on soil testing on unseeded areas, which were nearly 20 per cent of the potential acreage in Saskatchewan. Fertilizer sales could benefit from this year’s poor conditions, as nutrient balance will be more important to recover on unseeded land.

Shoenau expects the trend to continue, since “resources are limited. Soil nutrient management is going to be extremely important.”

In the aftermath of this year’s poor crop output, BHP Billiton’s attempts at a hostile takeover of PotashCorp — and other potential bidders — take on additional importance. The vast majority of the world’s potash is used in fertilizer to provide potassium to plants: The only other way to add potassium to crops is from animal by-products.

With next year’s optimistic forecast for fertilizer use, whoever runs Saskatchewan’s prime potash producer will affect global markets for food and fuel. One bidder on Potash Corp, Sinochem, might free up the market for potash if it takes over the company, which could keep fertilizer, and thus food production, costs down.

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image: Keith Folkersen