By Lyle Adriano
The Canola Council of Canada hopes to help the nation’s canola industry hit a production output of 26 million tonnes at 52 bushels per acre by 2025, using data compiled by the insurance sector to achieve this goal.
Although current production rates still fall short, the council discovered that some farmers who exercise careful crop management may have the key to improve production values for all. And after taking a good look at crop insurance data for answers, some farmers are already accomplishing the yield necessary to hit the 2025 target.
Canola Council vice-president of crop production and innovation Curtis Rempel said the data suggested that the farmers hitting optimal canola production levels were those who exercised crop management techniques to boost their yield.
Prairie canola yields were at their highest point at 40.6 bushels per acre in 2013 across almost a third of all crop acres in Western Canada, resulting in a record production of 18.4 million tonnes.
The past five-year average, however, was at 33.9 bushels per acre, which was 5.6% higher than the previous years and below the 13% increase for CWRS wheat. If canola yields continue to rise at the current rate, they will reach 37.6 bushels by next year—a long way off from the 52 bushels per acre target.
Notably, the data also revealed that many other farmers are using canola in tighter rotation than the typical one-in-four years rotation scheme, which usually results in lower yields.
The Council believes that more farmers need to stay informed about the latest in farming techniques in order to maximise canola yields. To accomplish this, the Council hopes that technology, such as an online portal on canola information, plays a major role in educating and supporting farmers.
“Growing canola is not prescriptive,” Rempel commented. “But all bets are off with some of the yields that we are seeing.”
“There are guidelines that we feel strongly about, like seeding rates, speed, seed depth and soil temperature,” Rempel remarked.
The council intends to cooperate with life science companies to reach out to farmers with information on best management practices.
