The world’s second largest country by total area, Canada spans more than 3.8 million square miles (9.98 million kilometers) of land and water. Its ten provinces and three territories are home to widely varying landscapes, many of which contribute to a prosperous produce industry.
The vast majority of Canada’s fruits and vegetables are grown in eight of the country’s provinces: Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec, and Prince Edward Island. We take a look at these provinces, the challenges their growers faced (from rain and hail to frost and pest outbreaks), and the resulting fluctuations of top crops grown within their borders.
Alberta
Home to an estimated 4 million people, Alberta is the most populous of Canada’s three Prairie provinces. The third largest food and beverage producing province, Alberta represents almost 20 percent (to the tune of nearly $9 billion annually) of Canada’s total agri-food exports.
In addition to being known as the “Sunshine Province,” Alberta is a major potato producer and its farmers grow 197 different varieties. The vast majority (approximately 85 percent) are for processing, ultimately used for French Fries and potato chips. About 10 percent are for seed and only 5 percent are for the fresh market.
Alberta ranks third in the country behind Prince Edward Island (PEI) and Manitoba in harvested acreage. Yields, however, are a different story: Alberta averages the highest annual yields of the provinces at over 361 hundredweight (cwt) per acre in 2014, with Manitoba close behind and PEI ranked fifth. The total annual value of the province’s potato industry is approximately $1 billion from 51,742 harvested acres.
Terence Hochstein, executive director with the Potato Growers of Alberta, says the 2013-14 season was an average year as far as production. “It was a long harvest because of wet weather,” he explains.
In fact, Hochstein says variable weather was the greatest challenge for Alberta potato growers in 2014. “We’re predominantly irrigation in Southern Alberta where process potatoes are grown, but Mother Nature did not cooperate,” he remarks. “Weather was our biggest issue all year long: we had an early frost, we had some snow, and we had lots of rain in the fall before we started our harvest.”
In both 2013 and 2014, Alberta potato growers also contended with late blight, the potato disease responsible for the devastating Irish Potato Famine back in the 1800s. Though Alberta’s late blight was contained and not widespread, there can be significant yield and quality losses during an outbreak.
The world’s second largest country by total area, Canada spans more than 3.8 million square miles (9.98 million kilometers) of land and water. Its ten provinces and three territories are home to widely varying landscapes, many of which contribute to a prosperous produce industry.
The vast majority of Canada’s fruits and vegetables are grown in eight of the country’s provinces: Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec, and Prince Edward Island. We take a look at these provinces, the challenges their growers faced (from rain and hail to frost and pest outbreaks), and the resulting fluctuations of top crops grown within their borders.
Alberta
Home to an estimated 4 million people, Alberta is the most populous of Canada’s three Prairie provinces. The third largest food and beverage producing province, Alberta represents almost 20 percent (to the tune of nearly $9 billion annually) of Canada’s total agri-food exports.
In addition to being known as the “Sunshine Province,” Alberta is a major potato producer and its farmers grow 197 different varieties. The vast majority (approximately 85 percent) are for processing, ultimately used for French Fries and potato chips. About 10 percent are for seed and only 5 percent are for the fresh market.
Alberta ranks third in the country behind Prince Edward Island (PEI) and Manitoba in harvested acreage. Yields, however, are a different story: Alberta averages the highest annual yields of the provinces at over 361 hundredweight (cwt) per acre in 2014, with Manitoba close behind and PEI ranked fifth. The total annual value of the province’s potato industry is approximately $1 billion from 51,742 harvested acres.
Terence Hochstein, executive director with the Potato Growers of Alberta, says the 2013-14 season was an average year as far as production. “It was a long harvest because of wet weather,” he explains.
In fact, Hochstein says variable weather was the greatest challenge for Alberta potato growers in 2014. “We’re predominantly irrigation in Southern Alberta where process potatoes are grown, but Mother Nature did not cooperate,” he remarks. “Weather was our biggest issue all year long: we had an early frost, we had some snow, and we had lots of rain in the fall before we started our harvest.”
In both 2013 and 2014, Alberta potato growers also contended with late blight, the potato disease responsible for the devastating Irish Potato Famine back in the 1800s. Though Alberta’s late blight was contained and not widespread, there can be significant yield and quality losses during an outbreak.
“We did have a little bit of late blight in Alberta this year, but it was quite a bit less than the previous year,” comments Hochstein. Fortunately, the Potato Growers of Alberta recently created an education program to inform growers, garden store owners, and the general public about late blight and teach them how to prevent it. “That made a big difference,” he adds.
For the 2014-15 season, Hochstein expects acreage and production to remain pretty much the same, although he does see potential growth in Alberta’s fresh potato acreage which has grown the last two or three years, a trend he expects to continue.
In addition to potatoes, the province also grows sweet corn, carrots, cabbage, beets, peas, and pumpkins as well as a small amount of Saskatoon berries, strawberries, and raspberries. According to Statistics Canada, Alberta’s overall vegetable sales continue to rise.
British Columbia
Nestled between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, British Columbia is Canada’s westernmost and third largest province at 364,764 square miles. It features a wide array of topographies, from mountains and coastland to plains and fjords.
Thanks to British Columbia’s diverse climates and fertile soil, growers in the province produce a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables. Mushrooms are a major crop; more than 35 percent of all Canadian mushrooms are grown there. Berries, wine grapes, tree fruit, and nuts are also top crops, grown on more than 56,834 acres of farmland, which helped the province become Canada’s second highest fruit and nut producer, valued at more than $300 million annually.
British Columbia is also Canada’s largest producer for several individual commodities such as blueberries, sweet cherries, raspberries, pears, and apricots, and the second largest producer of cranberries, grapes, peaches, strawberries, plums/prunes, and nectarines for 2013. The province is also ideally situated for exports, shipping its fruit and nuts to nearly three dozen different markets worldwide.
The Okanagan Valley in southwest British Columbia is home to most of the province’s tree fruit orchards. Apples and sweet cherries are the two largest tree-fruit crops, and cherry production area has expanded significantly over the past few years. Growers produced Canada’s second largest tree fruit crop ever in 2013, and suppliers had high hopes for a repeat in 2015, since 2014 totals were affected by severe weather.
Lance McGinn, director of sales with B.C. Tree Fruits Cooperative in Kelowna, says his business experienced very low volume in the 2013-14 season, due in large part to extensive hail damage. The destructive hailstorm struck east of Kelowna in August 2013, pummeling crops and causing up to $6 million in total damage.
Nevertheless, McGinn was optimistic about the future and several new ventures, including an offshoot of the Cooperative’s top commodity, apples, into cider production. “This company will be producing Real Apple Cider from 100 percent local British Columbia apples,” McGinn remarks.
True to its name, B.C. Tree Fruits also handles cherries, pears, peaches, prunes, nectarines, apricots, and a limited volume of plums. “Our growers are replanting new varieties,” McGinn says, which he hopes will be “best suited to market demand and expectations.” The Cooperative is also “planning for expansion in the apple and cherry category, as our new plantings come into production.”
Manitoba
Manitoba, the “Keystone Province,” is located between Saskatchewan to the west and Ontario to the east (with Nunavut to the north). Its long, warm growing season, hearty soil, and abundance of water help the province’s farmers grow more than 110 different types of vegetables. Top vegetable crops include potatoes, carrots, onions, cabbage, cauliflower, sweet corn, broccoli, and an increasing array of Asian vegetables such as baby corn, bok choy, and several varieties of cabbage.
Manitoba’s southern and western regions have proven ideal for growing potatoes, and the province supplies nearly 20 percent of Canada’s yearly crop. Although harvested acreage has fallen over the last few years from 75,500 acres in 2012 to 62,450 acres in 2014, yields have risen from an average of 275 hundredweight per acre in 2012 to a peak of 310 hundredweight in 2013, then dipped slightly to 304.5 hundredweight per acre in 2014. Luckily for some of Manitoba’s spud producers, the province is home to four potato-processing plants, so grower-shippers can save on freight costs.
Although vegetables are dominant, Manitobans also grow fruit, including apples and chokecherries (a cousin to black cherries), as well as a variety of berries such as blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, Saskatoon berries, gooseberries, pinch berries, and Buffaloberries. The province has also followed the lead of Ontario in converting field acreage to greenhouses, for steady production of cucumbers and lettuce without worry of the region’s often tumultuous temperatures.
New Brunswick
While its much larger sibling, Quebec, is a French-speaking province, New Brunswick is constitutionally bilingual, with residents speaking both English and French. And although this maritime province consists of only 28,150 square miles (72,908 square kilometers), there are some 3,000 farms in New Brunswick, generating $400 million in farm cash receipts each year.
Despite the province’s snowy, frigid winters, New Brunswick is a notable producer of apples, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, and potatoes, which are primarily grown in the St. John River Valley.
Wild blueberries are one of the fastest growing commodities in the province, with an annual revenue increase of 25 percent a year in the last decade. Value has more than tripled over the past ten years, reaching over $30 million annually.
New Brunswick’s top crop, however, remains potatoes. In 2014, the province harvested 48,050 acres with an average yield of just under 300 hundredweight per acre, and total production reached 14.3 million hundredweight for the year, up from 13.7 million hundredweight in 2013.
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia is a Maritime province, along with New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island. Known as “Canada’s Ocean Playground,” its agriculture sector continues to grow incrementally, especially in fruit such as berries and apples.
While Nova Scotia is most well-known for the blueberries and apples grown in its Annapolis Valley region, it is also a major strawberry producer, typically accounting for 7 percent of Canada’s overall strawberry output. Unfortunately, the province’s strawberry production plummeted in 2013 due to a virus outbreak in the fields. The relatively new disease, a complex combination of two known viruses, was spread by a small insect called the strawberry aphid. The virus weakened the plants, causing either undesirably small berries or preventing plants from flowering altogether. Growers were forced to plow under almost a third of their strawberry fields in 2013 due to virus damage.
In December 2013, the Canada-Nova Scotia Strawberry Assistance Initiative provided $2.3 million to assist strawberry producers affected by the virus with the one-time extraordinary cost of removing and replacing plants. As a result, the province’s strawberry production began to bounce back in 2014, although official numbers are not yet available.
In addition to its famous fruit, Nova Scotia’s field and greenhouse vegetables are also on the rise. From 2012 to 2013, cash receipts for greenhouse vegetables skyrocketed by 53 percent to $7.8 million and field vegetables jumped by 23 percent to $26.1 million. Nova Scotia’s greenhouse tomato production increased by 38 percent in 2013, and production of greenhouse cucumbers increased by more than 40 percent.
Also an important produce exporter, Nova Scotia’s total agri-food exports were valued at approximately $359 million in 2013, including $100.3 million in blueberry exports.
Ontario
With an abundance of water, fertile farmland throughout the southern region and grassy lowlands across the north, Ontario is an agricultural powerhouse. The province is home to more than 50,000 farms, which generated more than $12 billion in cash receipts for 2013.
A major vegetable producer, Ontario grows a wide range of seasonal commodities from asparagus to zucchini. Top field vegetable earners include mushrooms, sweet corn, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage, onions, asparagus, peppers, pumpkins, squash, and broccoli. The province is also a notable potato producer, with an annual average of 38,000 harvested acres valued at more than $100 million.
Ontario has another claim to fame as well: it is one of North America’s largest producers of greenhouse vegetables with over 2,000 acres devoted to tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers. Annual receipts top $300 million for tomatoes, and over $500 million for peppers and cucumbers combined.
The province’s southwestern region offers moderate temperatures, also making it an ideal growing environment for fruit. In the peninsula below the Niagara Escarpment, farmers grow a bounty of wine grapes and stone fruit. Ontario’s major apple producing areas are along the shores of Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, Lake Huron, and Georgian Bay. The lakes’ water temperatures help shield the adjoining land from late spring and early fall frosts, extending the region’s growing season. Top fruit earners include grapes, apples, peaches, strawberries, melons, sour cherries, and pears.
Anthony Agresti, president of ATV Farms Holland Landing, a grower-shipper in Newcastle, says the province’s weather caused a number of challenges in the 2013-14 season. “A few of our key farms lost most of their crop due to flooding,” he explains. While some growers in the area were still recovering from damage, he says things are bouncing back. “This year started off with the lowest market on carrots and onions in years, but now it’s moving up—especially on carrots.”
Quebec
The largest province in Canada, Quebec is home to a thriving agriculture industry. With more than 30,000 farms that generated $8.3 billion in cash receipts in 2013, Quebec’s agricultural sector relies heavily on fruit and vegetable production.
The St. Lawrence River Valley is the heart of the province’s agricultural sector. The region’s rich, arable soils and a relatively warm climate is well suited to apple growing. The Centre-du-Quebec region, located midway between Montreal and Quebec City on the south shore of the St. Lawrence, grows an abundance of cranberries, strawberries, and raspberries, while blueberries abound in the Saguenay Lac-St. Jean region, named for the Saguenay River and the immense Lake St.-Jean. The Côte-Nord region, located in the northeastern portion of the province, is also a significant blueberry producing region.
Centre Maraîcher Eugène Guinois, Jr. Inc., a grower and exporter, specializes in various types of lettuce, as well as broccoli, cabbage, onions, carrots, and celery.
Located near the New York state border in St. Clotilde de Chateauguay, Arthur Patenaude, in sales, comments, “Thinking back to the summer of 2014, we had our challenges. Like everywhere else, weather is a factor that drives our industry.” The company’s high-tech 25,000-square-foot warehouse helps in that regard, so vegetables can be transferred quickly from the fields and vacuum-cooled at the facility. “Our harvesting crew and sales team work to get the most out of our crop,” he confirms. Better yet, he adds, “Pricing was very good.”
Among market trends, Patenaude finds consumers “are always looking for packaged or ready-to-use product,” which is why Centre Maraîcher has partnered with a cutting-edge packaging firm for its value-added items.
According to Statistics Canada, Quebec experienced a significant drop in fruit sales in 2013 but saw an increase in vegetable sales, such as leafy greens and potatoes. Quebec’s Ministry of Agriculture reports the total value of field and greenhouse vegetables grown in 2013 was $417.1 million, including $131.7 million of potatoes.
Prince Edward Island
Although Prince Edward Island (PEI) is the smallest province, it’s also Canada’s top potato producer, accounting for a quarter of the country’s potatoes. The potato industry is worth more than $1 billion to PEI’s economy each year.
Approximately 60 percent of PEI or “Spud Island” potatoes are destined for processing into French fries and potato chips, 30 percent go to the fresh market through retail or foodservice, and the remaining 10 percent are grown for seed purposes.
In 2013, PEI producers harvested potatoes totaling 25 million hundredweight of product. The province’s potato farm cash receipts vary from $200 to $260 million annually, and approximately 90,500 acres of PEI potatoes were planted in 2014. PEI’s seed and table potatoes are shipped to over 20 countries annually, including the United States. In 2013, PEI’s fresh potato exports were valued at $45.5 million and frozen potato exports reached $194.7 million.
Gary Linkletter, president of Linkletter Farms Ltd., a potato grower and shipper in Summerside, says the potato crop they have in storage right now is looking good. “The size profile is a little larger than normal, so we’ve got a very, very good crop.” Though pricing is not quite as high as he would like, “We’re hoping with the size profile we won’t have a big surplus,” he says, “but the market is trying to find its level.”
Linkletter says a drought last summer knocked back the set, resulting in the larger size of the region’s potatoes. “The growing season started off very cold,” he says, then the temperatures will even out for the summer. “In the fall, we had good harvest until late October when most people were just wrapping up, but then it started raining.” Although most of the harvest was already complete, “the last 10 percent or so got quite wet. But the quality of the storage looks really good.”
Looking Ahead
Canadian produce growers face a number of unique obstacles, from wildly unpredictable weather to a tough economy and fluctuating dollar. Yet the country’s growers continue to adapt and diversify, trying new fruit or vegetable varieties, building more greenhouses, and implementing cutting-edge growing techniques.
Although no one can predict precisely what the future holds for Canada’s produce growers, one thing is certain: the True North will continue to serve up a diverse bounty of fresh produce to consumers across the globe.
