A deep dive into how regenerative organic agricultural practices can benefit soil health with Brent Preston and Gillian Flies from The New Farm. Gillian Flies and Brent Preston own and operate The New Farm, a vegetable farm that provides high-quality, organic produce to fine restaurants and specialty retail stores in the Toronto and Collingwood areas.
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Save the dates! University of Manitoba professor Dr. Martin Entz is running an organic agronomy training course in January 2023. Dr. Entz’s training is intended for private and public sector agronomists who want to respond to the growing demand from producers for more information about organic grain production. While the course was designed with the
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The FAO’s recent webcast on Sound Fertilization for Food Security in the Context of the Current Crisis comes at a critical time for the agricultural sector. In recent years, farmers have faced a number of setbacks. Along with extreme weather conditions, the agricultural sector’s attempt to recover from supply chain disruptions during the pandemic has
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Canada’s Agricultural Policy Framework (APF) is a 5-year investment made by federal, provincial and territorial governments to develop Canada’s agricultural sector. The government consults with Canadians during the framework’s developments, from stakeholders to youth, to assess the desired outcomes of the policies and programs to be implemented. The next APF will be launched in 2023,
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Though it may seem laborious to grow plants that will never be harvested, cover crops can bring many benefits to Canadian farmers. At the EFAO conference’s webinar: Greenlander! Expanding the use of cover crops in organic vegetable farming, cover crop farmers and experts Jeff Boesch from Cedar Down Farm and Reid Allaway from Tourne-Sol Co-operative Farm shared insights drawn from years of experience with cover cropping.

How can organic farmers reduce tillage on their farms? In this webinar, Brett Israel from 3Gen Organic, Aaron Bowman from Bowmanview Farms, Jake Munroe from OMAFRA and Mel Luymes discussed this struggle.

There is a wealth of research that explores the diverse environmental benefits of organic agriculture. Many farmers may want to experiment with practices that carry environmental benefits, but are concerned about potential profit losses or unforeseen consequences. Read on to learn how organic agriculture can be just as profitable as, or even more profitable than, conventional agriculture.

Each organic or regenerative farm is as unique as the farmers who keep it running, especially when it comes to dealing with organic agriculture’s most infamous challenge: weeds. Read on to learn how five organic Ontario-based farmers and researchers use different approaches to achieve this goal in weed management.

In 2021, nitrogen fertilizer saw a huge price spike due to a string of severe weather events like Hurricane Ida and the February Texas cold snap. Alongside other supply-chain disruptions, these events have led to global shortages and decade-high consumer prices. Is there a way we can limit our dependance on nitrogen fertilizer?

Regardless of size or location, farms are closely connected to their surrounding environment—through the soil, water systems, insects and wildlife. All organisms within an ecosystem depend on each other, and the healthiest ecosystems contain a wide range of species that interact in diverse and mutually beneficial ways. Agro-biodiversity tries to mimic natural species diversity by increasing the variety of crops and other organisms in a single farming system. It offers farmers many useful tools to improve soil health and reduce reliance on inputs without sacrificing profits. Having more species working together creates more stable farming systems that are resilient against harsh conditions like severe weather, pests and disease.

statement that, while true, is vastly oversimplified. While there is a general consensus that healthy soil is central to sustainable farming, less is known about the practice of using soil organic matter to store carbon as a climate solution. Conversations about the “soil solution” do not always dive into the details of how soil sequesters carbon, leaving room for skepticism about its effectiveness when compared to flashier technological carbon-capture solutions. In this article, we’ll break down how soil absorbs carbon and why it is an amazing natural phenomenon worth getting excited about.

Organic regenerative farming is all about soil, and there is a growing body of fascinating research revealing critical information about the role soil can play in responding to the climate crisis. With this information gaining more and more attention as the climate crisis worsens, many consumers are asking: What’s so special about dirt and what are the links between soil and climate change?