Money will be used to build Ontario Sustainable Crop Research and Innovation Centre
By Diego Flammini
Assistant Editor, North American Content
Farms.com
Pride Seeds announced its donating $150,000 to help the University of Guelph’s Ridgetown Campus build the Ontario Sustainable Crop Research and Innovation Centre.
The facility will include a molecular genetics lab, analytical lab, fermentation lab suites, seed preparation and evaluation labs and plant breeding equipment.
In a release, Doug Alderman, vice-presdient, sales and marketing, said the new building will help improve agriculture across Canada.
“As a Canadian company, we’re proud of our contribution to Canada’s agri-food system, which is recognized internationally as one of the safest and most progressive in the world,” Alderman said, according to the Sydenham Current.
“The proposed new crops innovation centre represents a long-term commitment towards ensuring that Ridgetown Campus will continue to provide important applied research solutions for Ontario and Canadian farmers for decades to come, and we’re very pleased to be a part of it.”
Rob Gordon, dean of the Ontario Agricultural College, said the research centre is needed to keep up with emerging crop challenges.
“There are a lot (of) emerging issues and technologies that require us to maybe think about our crop production systems in a slightly different way,” he told Better Farming in February.
The estimated cost of the project is between $15 and $20 million. Approximately $4 million will come from the private sector.