Big crop at tiny school
Become a ‘trusted source’
Alonsa turns schoolyard into classroom » PG 20
Ottawa conference discusses industry future » PG 18
SERVING MANITOBA FARMERS SINCE 1925 | Vol. 73, No. 47 | $1.75
November 19, 2015
Small farmers consider organization
manitobacooperator.ca
Atlas showing future climate change under development
Nov. 24 meeting will explore how to best represent small-scale farms
An online resource of maps and data will help planners adapt to climate change
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON Co-operator staff
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mall-scale producers who sell mostly direct to consumers will meet next week to decide whether they have enough in common to form a new Manitoba farm organization. A good turnout for the meeting Nov. 24 is expected, but it remains to be seen whether they can unify under an umbrella organization, one of the organizers said in an interview. “I think the meeting will be well attended. Getting them to agree... that could be interesting,” said Phil Veldhuis, who served on a provincially mandated 17-member working group for the small-scale sector last year. Their report tabled in January — Advancing the small-scale, local food sector in Manitoba, delved into the multiple challenges faced by this province’s burgeoning number of farmers who produce primarily for a local market. The 65-page report, authored by retired chief provincial veterinarian Dr. Wayne Lees identified an emerging sector of highly diversified, entrepre-
Fall field work was still underway in many areas of the province under record-high temperatures last Sunday, including along Mountain Road just east of Erickson. Projections from the new Winnipeg-based Prairie Climate Centre suggest this could be a more common mid-November sight in future. Photo: Luc Gamache
BY LORRAINE STEVENSON Co-operator staff
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See SMALL FARMS on page 6 »
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rowing conditions on the Can adian Prairies will be very different if global warming trends continue — but how different? A new series of online maps offers a glimpse of the length of season, temperature changes and rainfall farmers in the not-so-distant future could face under various scenarios. The maps are part of a ‘climate atlas’ being developed as a joint venture between the University of Winnipeg and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD). Data is now being posted online (climate.uwinnipeg.ca) with much more to come, said Danny Blair, the climatologist at the University of Winnipeg leading a research team on the project.
“What we’ll soon have, that will be of interest to the agricultural community and others, are maps showing the changes to the length of the growing season, changes to the timing of the first frost in the fall and last frost in the spring, changes in corn heat units, change in degree days of various kinds, and the number of cold days and hot days per year,” said Blair. It’s a lot of complicated data but they’ve worked to format so that the climate atlas will show a range of climate change scenarios with an outlook as far as 2080, Blair said.
Climate models The atlas will project a dozen different climate models, Blair said. That’s because there are many possible climate change scenarios, depending on how society addresses carbon emissions. “It presents a range of climate mod-
els. You cannot choose just one and say ‘this is the future,’” he said. The climate atlas initially began as a stand-alone project after the provincial climate change branch requested the researchers generate some data showing what Manitoba’s climate might look like 30 to 60 years from now. But it’s become clear that resources and expertise for adaptative planning and implementation aren’t available to citizens, community planners and policy-makers. Developers realized this data shouldn’t remain confined to academic circles or internal government reports, but instead be translated into language and formats the public will find useful. “So we made a pitch to the province for the need for a larger project which was to not only generate this data, but to work with the community and show how climate change is likely to impact See CLIMATE on page 6 »
MacAulay gets his marching orders » PAGE 5