A different approach to upcoming annual farm group meetings

Some changes are coming to the meeting events organized by the crop commissions in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta over the next couple of months.

There’s no longer one large meeting event with keynote speakers during Crop Production Week in Saskatoon. SaskCanola, Sask Wheat, SaskBarley, SaskFlax and Saskatchewan Pulse Growers are holding back-to-back annual business meetings at the Western Development Museum in Saskatoon on Tuesday, January 9. These are AGMs without guest speakers. The Crop Production Show will be running Tuesday to Thursday at nearby Prairieland Park. A few groups will have speakers along with their AGM. Sask Oats is holding its event at Prairieland Park on January 10. Sask Mustard is holding its AGM with guest speakers at Prairieland Park January 11. A couple groups are holding their meetings outside of that traditional week in January and at different locations. The Saskatchewan Forage Seed Development Commission is holding its annual meeting and forage seed production forum December 11 at Whitefox in northeastern Saskatchewan where many of its forage seed growers are located. The Canary Seed Development Commission is holding its AGM along with several additional speakers at a Regina hotel on December 14. Check out www.saskcrops.com and www.cropweek.com for what’s going on and to register.

It’s a much simpler formula for Ag Days in Brandon on January 16, 17 and 18. The huge trade show has two theatres with non-stop speakers each day covering topics ranging from agronomy, to marketing to politics. Commodity groups and Manitoba Agriculture are heavily involved in the speaker line-up. You can take in whatever speakers you want as part of your $20 a day admission to the trade show.

In Alberta, FarmTech has morphed into an event called CrossRoads Crop Conference. It’s sponsored by Alberta Canola, Alberta Grains and Alberta Pulse Growers on January 29 to 31. As Shawn Jacula, a farmer from Vermilion and director with Alberta Grains explains, this year, CrossRoads is being moved from Edmonton to the Westin Calgary Airport.