Survey Finds Canadians Understand Importance of Farmers

Dec 13, 2022

The 2022 Perceptions of Canadian Agriculture Survey found that 98 per cent of Canadians recognize the country’s farmers importance to domestic food security, a Dec. 12 news release release said. It also found four-in-five Canadians say they are confident in the country’s farmers’ ability to continue meeting domestic food demand.

According to the national survey, when Canadians were asked about the extreme weather events that occurred in the past year, 62 per cent say they have an increased appreciation for Canadian agriculture. In regions such as British Columbia 76 per cent of respondents noted an increase in appreciation after major flooding events impacted key agricultural regions of the province in 2021.

“Canadians are making the connection on the importance of Canadian farmers to our food system,” Matt Eves, Bayer Digital Farming Lead – Canada, said in the release.

The study also found that knowledge of innovation in Canadian agriculture is low, with 36 per cent saying they don’t know how it compares to other Canadian industries and another two-in-five expecting it’s about the same.

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Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.