Gov’t of Alberta increases ag budget

The 2021 budget for Alberta Agriculture and Forestry is $841 million

Representatives from the Government of Alberta recently released their budget for 2021, including the Agriculture and Forestry budget.

While the overall budget for the province is looking at a $18 billion deficit for this year, agriculture’s budget increased.

“It's actually up $8 million from last year, it's $841 million,” said Devin Dreeshen, minister of Alberta Agriculture and Forestry.

Highlights of the ag budget include $4.3 million going to fund access to utilities in rural Alberta, $11.5 million in funding to Alberta Agricultural societies and $37 million going towards research.

“That will go straight to Results Driven Agriculture Research,” Dreeshen told Farms.com. “That $37 million number is more than the other Prairie provinces combined when it comes to provincial agriculture research dollars. So, a really strong commitment into agriculture research in this budget.”

The 2021 budget also focuses on areas that were previously announced and worked on including irrigation and job creation, said Dreeshen.

“We have a 2,000 new job target as well … we've almost got about 1,000 new jobs, so we're about halfway on the jobs front,” he said. For the irrigation projects, we “actually have capital projects starting this year, you'll actually see dirt fly on these projects this spring and summer.”

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