The century of oil is drawing to an end in Alberta and the economic future of the province is going back to its European homesteaders’ beginning: agriculture and food.
Not going back to your great-grandparents' horse-drawn combine and steam-powered butter churn in the co-operative creamery, but a new technology-savant, economically- and environmentally-sustainable food producing operation.
And Olds College, one of Alberta’s smallest public post-secondary institutions, with just 1,775 students and 110 professional academics, is trail-blazing this new age of farming.
Driving the endeavour to make farming Alberta’s leading economic sector when crude oil and natural gas step back from centre stage is the college’s new president, a third-generation turkey farmer from Three Hills whose off-farm career has been to apply new technologies to businesses.
Stuart Cullum and his brother Pat operated a mixed turkey, grain and cattle farm. Stuart ran the turkey operation, started by his grandmother Fanny (neé Hammond, from Sunny Nook near Hanna). His father Steve and brother Pat took care of the wheat and grain, and together with Stuart they ran the cattle.
Stuart Cullum has worked in the private sector at AVAC Ltd, a venture capital company that fosters the commercialization of innovative products and services in agribusiness. He found his niche at WestLink Innovative Services helping Canadian colleges and universities from Ontario to British Columbia, and later at NAIT and the University of Lethbridge, commercializing the academic sector’s pure and applied research.
In an interview, Cullum said, “You have to be smart to be a successful farmer. You have to be a generalist with a great deal of specific knowledge, so what’s different now?
“Well, technology is becoming more advanced and advancement of the specific knowledge is accelerating.
“We are still going to need the generalists, but they are going to be surrounded by specialists who understand how to apply things like information technology, artificial intelligence, and genetics to the agribusiness business. One person just can’t have specialized knowledge across all of the fields.”
Said Cullum, “Olds College will support that transformation farm-by-farm through teaching, learning and applied research that will help this industry be successful in a highly technologically advanced world.”
Cullum has a team headed by vice-president Patrick Machacek writing a seven-year strategic plan to realize the vision.
The college will launch a Smart Farm this year. It is fundraising for the Werklund Agricultural Institute.
The new Collier family endowment fund awards $6,000 scholarships to five winners each year for developing innovative ideas in farming.
The winners this year were Allana Beuermann for a voluntary cleaning system for calf feeding systems, Shawn Chenard for a self-levelling grain auger, Emma Hanchuk for mare lactation induction, Simon Kouwenberg for tillage depth control and Brooklyn McDonald for work on hemp bedding.
Several of the 52 other submitted ideas that didn’t win the award are finding industry applications.
The change that Alberta faces in the next several decades will be enormous.
Before oil, Alberta had a population of less than 800,000, of whom 60 per cent were rural residents. Now there are 3.7 million Albertans, only 17 per cent of whom are rural.
In 2016, agribusiness generated $13.5 billion compared to $56.8 billion in oil, gas and coal.
The change that is coming will succeed on the shoulders of places like Olds College.
– Frank Dabbs is a veteran business and political journalist and author.
