Improving health with value-added agriculture projects

Olds – The Prairies are an agricultural powerhouse, and innovators across Alberta have new opportunities to create and commercialize technologies that benefit both the economy and the environment. Alberta is already a national and global leader across key sectors that contribute to Canada’s prosperity—from energy, environment, and aerospace to digital, life sciences and clean technology. Food production in Alberta is another important industry that is meeting a growing worldwide demand.

Through coordination across federal departments and in partnership with all levels of government and industry, the Government of Canada is enabling Alberta’s small- and medium-sized businesses to capitalize on opportunities that build on Alberta’s recognized strengths in creating products and services that the world needs.

Dan Vandal, Minister for PrairiesCan, announced federal investments of more than $21 million for 14 projects to build Alberta’s value-added agricultural sector through commercializing and developing new products, applications, and services.

Examples of projects receiving support include:

• Olds College is receiving more than $3 million to expand its Smart Farm operations into Saskatchewan and purchase new equipment to increase capacity to research agriculture challenges impacting the Prairies, including food security, crop protection, livestock health, and environmental sustainability.
• Stettler Adult Learning Council is receiving $250,000 to establish a Regenerative Agricultural Lab to help Alberta food producers and stakeholders explore and adopt sustainable regenerative agriculture practices.
• Pure Life Carbon is receiving over $2 million to upgrade and expand an existing manufacturing facility to increase production of its proprietary soil alternative products used in agricultural applications.
• Wyvern is receiving over $450,000 to launch a new proprietary system and network of satellites that significantly reduces the cost of satellite imaging used to increase the adoption of innovative farming solutions that help preserve ecological zones, increase agricultural yields, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions and water use.
• Alexander Business Corporation is receiving $146,800 to assess the feasibility of two plant-based protein opportunities for Alexander First Nation, including researching an investment opportunity and conducting a study of a possible nation-owned production facility that would sell raw flour to plant-based food retailers and ingredient manufacturers.
• Alberta Bio Processing Innovation Centre and Alberta Agrivalue Processing Business Incubator are provincially operated facilities that are receiving a combined $1,125,000 to purchase and install new equipment, which will enable more small- and medium-sized businesses to test and commercialize value-added agricultural or food products.

Projects receiving today’s funding will have significant environmental and economic benefits across the province and its strong agricultural sector, including supporting more than 800 jobs and helping Alberta organizations take advantage of the numerous economic opportunities associated with value-added agriculture. Today’s federal investment leverages about $12.5 million in additional funding through other levels of government and industry.