Thursday, November 15, 2012

The Canadian Corn Belt?

Climate change and relatively cheap land are bringing farmland investment money to the prairie provinces in Canada (h/t Big Picture Agriculture):
Canadian farmers in the prairie provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, long one of the greatest wheat-growing regions on Earth, have started planting corn, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Nov. 12 issue. The corn zone for government crop-insurance coverage reaches to Dan Mazier’s farm near Justice, Manitoba -- about 60 miles (97 kilometers) north of the U.S. border -- and ends right along a road that divides his property.
“I told them the sun shines on both sides of the road, but they haven’t caught up to the weather yet,” said Mazier, who sowed the grain for the first time this year. “So I only plant it south of the line.”
Corn’s new appeal to Canada’s prairie farmers is based on two things: climate change and price. Growing seasons in the prairie provinces -- which border Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana -- have lengthened about two weeks to as long as 120 days in the past half-century. The mean annual temperature is likely to climb by as much as 3 degrees Celsius (5 degrees Fahrenheit) in the region by 2050, according to Canadian researchers.
A temperate climate and longer growing season are ideal for corn. An acre of farmland produces more corn than wheat, making corn the more profitable grain, while the higher yields also drive up land values. Corn has long grown in southern Ontario’s mild climate, but for Canadians to be big players in the crop at a new order of magnitude they must plant in the vast farmland of the prairie provinces. Farmers sowed a record 121,400 hectares (300,000 acres) of corn in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta this year. That compares with an estimated 96.9 million acres sown in the U.S.
Canada may be a good investment play for temperate weather if global warming gets too bad.  The idea of a migration of the Corn belt there has crossed my mind in the past.

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