Integrating crop research will be the focus of a newly hired crop scientist at the University of Saskatchewan.
Dr. Maryse Bourgault will work with researchers and farmers in multiple disciplines to improve soil management and increase crop production potential and sustainability.
“What we want to do is take a step back and look at the systems in the bigger picture,” Bourgault said. “We don’t want to just look at the various components and the easy interaction that goes with it, but take a bigger step back and look at how all of the components of the system actually play together.”
Examples include crop rotations, herbicide weed resistance and possibly integrating livestock into cropping systems.
“We are trying to look at not only a few crops, but several crops together. Looking at what kind of interactions happen from one year to another,” she said.
Bourgault is a crop physiologist with a background in environmental sciences. She returns to Canada after spending the last 12 years working in Australia and the United States. Her last stop was the Northern Agricultural Research Centre at Montana State University.
The Western Grains Research Foundation (WGRF) is funding the new Integrated Agronomy Chair at the University of Saskatchewan. The farmer-funded and farmer-directed non-profit organization will spend $2 million over the next seven years.
“That’s part of a bigger program that started back in 2014 when we became aware of gaps in research capacity across Western Canada,” said Garth Paterson, WGRF executive director. “Since then, we have been working with universities in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, as well as Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to address some of these gaps.”
Patterson says Dr. Bourgault will work collaboratively with a wide array of research scientists.
“There are many specialists out there in different areas and our vision is that Maryse will work with them and others to look at some of these problems from a different approach,” he said.
Last month, the WGRF announced the establishment of a $3 million Cropping Systems Research Chair at the University of Alberta. Patterson says there will also be infrastructure and equipment investments over the next year or so at various public research institutions. He anticipates WGRF contributions to research, equipment and infrastructure will be close to $30 million over the next several years.
Photo: Dr. Maryse Bourgault (PhD) has been recruited as the first Western Grains Research Foundation Integrated Agronomy Research Chair at USask. Photo by Christina Weese.*
