Agri-food research: no frills here

by Owen Roberts

When the chips are down and it’s time to cut frills, where do you turn? Few farm operations have much fat; they likely cut frills years ago.

Some sectors might consider research a frill. After all, some say, it’s expensive, it seems to take forever, and when it yields results, they can be slow to be adopted.

But it’s different in the farm sector, especially when it comes to technology. Here, the line between a development and its application is comparatively minute. New technology can go from the lab to field trials, and then to growers, in almost no time. And the benefits are clear.

In the mid 1990s, agricultural economist Prof. George Brinkman at the University of Guelph gave the research community solid statistical fuel for supporting research. He found agricultural research in Ontario had a significant return on investment, with benefit-cost ratios typically 20:1 or more for individual commodities.

For the federal government – the country’s biggest supporter of agricultural research, investing about $700 million a year – this was one of the highest payback activities in the Canadian public sector.

And for growers, the news just got better and better. Brinkman also determined it was mainly producers, not the public, who accrued the overwhelming majority of research benefits – up to 96 per cent, depending on the commodity.

This was the kind of information the farm sector needed to throw its support behind research. When the Ontario ministry held meetings to ask producers their priorities for government support, research topped the list. Producers had become believers.

There’s proof research works each time the industry receives a new trait, variety or feature. For example, OAC Millennium asparagus, the winner of this year’s first Canadian Seed of the Year contest, announced at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair in Toronto, has revolutionized the asparagus industry. Developed by Prof. David Wolyn, University of Guelph, it has become a major part of the commodity’s competitiveness, and accounts for 70 per cent of all asparagus seed sold in Ontario.

The contest’s runners-up, OAC Kent soybeans and OAC Rex white beans, were likewise products of research, and offer major advantages to producers. OAC Kent is the most popular non-genetically modified yellow hilum full-season soybean in Ontario, while OAC Rex is the first white bean variety in Canada to deliver resistance to bacterial blight, a major disease affecting bean yields and quality.

There are more reasons to celebrate agricultural research. A privately commissioned study from the Western Grains Research Foundation found research advantages were widespread in praire crops, too. For example, every dollar invested in wheat development returns a minimum $4 to producers, while every dollar invested in barley returns a minimum $12. One of the study’s authors, Dr. Hartley Furtan, an agricultural economist at the University of Saskatchewan, says both findings reveal a remarkably high return on investment.

So whether you’re in the East or West, you’re realizing benefits from agricultural research. It’s a no-frills investment.

Subscribe now to get your free AgriSuccess Journal delivered to your mailbox every two months.
Return to headlines.