Annual General Meeting 2016
The 11th Annual Meeting of the SFSDC for the fiscal year 2015-2016 was held in Nipawin SK on December 1, 2016. Chair, David Maxwell gave welcoming remarks and introduced the Board of Directors, Advisors and Researchers. David’s annual report described many of the Board’s activities for the year including:
Advanced research initiatives in the forage seed area by continuing to work with the Northeast Agriculture Research Foundation (NARF) at Melfort and the Weed Management Group at the University in Saskatoon;
Leveraged our money for research through funding sources like Saskatchewan Agriculture’s ADOPT program, allowing us to spend levy dollars on other important areas such as weed and insect control, alternate planting methods and fertility work;
Held four Board meetings during this fiscal year. In July, our guest speaker was Penny McCall, Executive Director of Crops & Irrigation Branch with Saskatchewan Agriculture. Penny talked about the high trust level the general public has in farmers working to keep their food safe. This shows us that we must make efforts to maintain this trust or new regulations could make our lives much more complicated in the future;
Membership in the Saskatchewan Forage Network allows us to work with larger organizations like the Saskatchewan Cattlemen’s Association and Sask Milk to fund research needs and increase support from the major funders for forage crop research;
Membership in Forage Seed Canada allows us to keep in contact with issues that impact the Prairies; and
Held our annual field tour in conjunction with the Saskatchewan Forage Council at the University of Saskatchewan on July 26th with 38 in attendance. Also attended the NARF annual field day on July 20th. Both tours were very informative.
Executive Director, Ray McVicar’s report provided additional highlights of the 2015-2016 year including:
Our research program included minor use herbicide applications on three clovers, slender wheatgrass, hybrid bromegrass, Timothy, sainfoin and cicer milkvetch as well as plant growth regulators on three established clovers;
Saskatchewan Agriculture provided funding for two ADOPT projects that were completed at NARF in 2015 and reports made available in 2016: Fungicides on established timothy and tall fescue crops; and Evaluating the Placement of Companion Crops in Forage Seed Production;
ADOPT funding was also received for three projects at NARF in 2016: Lesser Clover Leaf Weevil control in Red Clover, Alternate Row Placement of Companion Crops with meadow bromegrass and wheat, and Alternate Row Placement and spring tillage versus no tillage with red clover and faba bean; and
The forage seed levy increased to $ 97,474 in 2015-2016 in most part due to an excellent red clover crop and good prices. The number of levy payers also increased to 203. A total of 4.8 million kg of forage seed (excluding alfalfa) was purchased from Saskatchewan growers with a value of $13.8 Million.
The Commission used the services of a new Auditor this year and the 2015-2016 Audited Financial Statements were reviewed. Vice Chair, James Silcox updated the group on the planned activities and Budget for the 2016-2017 fiscal year. NeuPath Group, Nipawin SK was appointed as Auditor for 2016-2017.
Thank you to our levy payers, forage seed buyers, researchers and funding organizations for their support of the SFSDC’s program. Please see the SFSDC 2015-2016 Annual Report including the financial statements under ANNUAL REPORTS on this website.