Sask Nears Deal to Save Scott, Indian Head Research Farms

Saskatchewan Agriculture Minister Dave Marit says the province is making progress on a deal to keep the federal Scott and Indian Head research farms open.

The province and Ottawa signed an MOU in July 2026, but Marit says several layers of federal approval are slowing the transfer.

Marit's first priority is keeping current staff, and the province is still weighing who would operate the farms.

Source: 980 CJME

Saskatchewan says it is close to a deal to keep two federal research farms, Scott and Indian Head, open after Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada put them on the chopping block.

Agriculture Minister Dave Marit told 980 CJME he's "confident we're going to land in a good spot."

The province and Ottawa signed an MOU back in July. It is now November. That's four months of paperwork to hand over something Ottawa already said it didn't want.

In January 2026, AAFC announced it would close several research farms nationwide as part of budget cuts. Two were in Saskatchewan.

Marit blames federal bureaucracy: several layers of approval are needed to transfer the farms, and more than his ministry is involved.

Translation: Ottawa decided in January it couldn't afford to run the farms, then spent the months since proving it also can't afford to give them away quickly. Somewhere a form is waiting on a signature from a person who is waiting on a form.

These are working Prairie trial sites. Scott sits in west-central Saskatchewan and Indian Head east of Regina, and research stations are where varieties and agronomy get tested in the dirt farmers actually farm, not in a brochure.

Staff come first. Marit says keeping current employees is his top priority. Good call, because a research station's real asset is the person who remembers which plot drowned in a wet year, and you can't put that in an MOU.

Who runs them is still open. The province is weighing options. CJME reported no dollar figures, deadlines, or staff numbers, so the fine print is still unwritten.

Bottom line: "Confident" and "closing in" are not a signed agreement. Until the ink's dry, file this under good news, pending.

CentrePort Canada is starting a large expansion in Winnipeg just as the federal government analyzes where to spend $1 billion on four food terminals and 20 to 40 food hubs aimed at food security, CBC reports.

CEO Carly Edmundson says CentrePort is well positioned to sit at the centre of food supply networks. Its footprint covers 80 square kilometres of northwest Winnipeg and the RM of Rosser, with Peak of the Market on its eastern edge.

Update to Oct. 27: we covered CentrePort's Churchill MOU with Arctic Gateway Group and DP World last week. Now it's adding a food angle to the logistics pitch.

So what: Prairie farms grow the raw goods, and wherever those terminals and hubs land decides where product gets stored, packed and shipped. Ottawa hasn't picked locations yet, so expect every inland port with a parking lot to suddenly discover a deep passion for food security.

Researchers at UBC, the University of Alberta and USask's Crop Development Centre found a single gene in the spelt variety CDC Silex that gives near-complete, durable resistance to stripe rust.

The gene, named QYr.cbl-5D, behaves as a single dominant gene. CDC Silex showed near-immune adult-plant resistance, meaning the crop largely shrugged off the disease once it got past its early growth stages.

The catch: move it into bread wheat and the protection disappears. Researchers think something in bread wheat's own genome is silencing it. It's like finally hiring the best operator in the district and finding out the foreman won't let him near the combine.

Who paid: the Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture, Sask Wheat, Alberta Grains and the Manitoba Crop Alliance. That's your checkoff dollars, doing actual science.

So what: stripe rust has become an increasingly persistent problem for western Canadian wheat growers. Don't look for this in the seed guide next spring. The next job is finding the suppressor so breeders can work around it. And yes, that's exactly the kind of long, unglamorous work research farms exist for. Funny how that works.

Nominations are open for the first Top 7 Over 70 awards for Regina and Southern Saskatchewan, recognizing seven people aged 70+ who started something new or seriously reinvented themselves later in life. Agriculture is an eligible field.

Nominees must be 70 or older and live from Davidson south. Each nomination needs a form and two letters of support. Deadline: Jan. 15, 2027.

The gala is April 28, 2027, at the Turvey Centre in Regina, with former senator Pamela Wallin as MC. It raises money for the Alzheimer Society of Saskatchewan, and FCC is among the sponsors.

So what: every district has someone who "retired," then somehow ended up with more cows, a new business and less free time than before. This is your chance to rat them out for a good cause.

Saskatchewan's new Time Act makes Central Standard Time the province's only time zone, so Lloydminster now stays on Sask time year-round instead of falling back to Mountain time each winter.

Government Relations Minister Eric Schmalz said that without the change, the city would have become a "time island." Mayor Gerald Aalbers said he's pleased keeping track of time won't be one of the border city's quirks.

The Act also lets Saskatchewan respond if neighbouring provinces change their time rules, and drops the requirement for local votes to change time within a school division.

So what: one less way to show up an hour early (or late) for a delivery slot, a sale or a coffee row on the wrong side of Highway 17.