Some farmers, depending on the region, are dealing with their third or even fourth consecutive year of drought — with 2021 being an exceptionally bad year that saw production of some crops in Canada fall to their lowest level in more than a decade.
Sean Stanford's wheat farm just south of Lethbridge, Alta. falls within the far left corner of Palliser's Triangle — an expanse of prairie grassland encompassing much of southeast Alberta, a swath of southern Saskatchewan, and the southwest corner of Manitoba.
But Stanford is growing crops, thanks to a series of small sprinklers, attached to a large pipe and powered by an electric motor that disperse water from a nearby irrigation canal over some of his fields. And while that's just over five per cent of the province's total agricultural land base, it accounts for 19 per cent of Alberta's gross primary agricultural production. Farmers in irrigation districts are able to produce high-value, specialized crops such as sugar beets and greenhouse vegetables.
That's part of the reason behind a recent push to modernize and expand irrigation infrastructure in this country. Jodie Parmar, head of project development for Western Canada with the Canada Infrastructure Bank, said even Ontario and some of the Atlantic provinces have expressed interest in exploring irrigation projects recently.
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