• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Country Life In BC Logo

The agricultural news source in British Columbia since 1915

  • Headlines
  • Calendar
  • Subscribe
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Archives
  • Contact
  • Search
  • Headlines
  • Calendar
  • Subscribe
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Archives
  • Contact
  • Search

Primary Sidebar

Originally published:

OCTOBER 2022
Vol. 108 Issue 10

Subscribe Now!

Sign up for free weekly FARM NEWS UPDATES


By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: . You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact
Your information will not be
shared or sold ever

Stories In This Edition

Greenhouse effect

Animal welfare under review

Avian influenza returns

BC Tree Fruit consolidation triggers revolt

Editorial: Sovereign realities

Back 40: Water remains a battleground in the US, BC

Viewpoint: Is agritech the tail wagging the dog?

Abattoir closure leaves producers scrambling

Canada comes up short on farm risk management

The show must go on

Ag Briefs: 4-H projects sell well at PNE

Ag Briefs: Strong growth for organics

Ag Briefs: Rate hike demands planning

Ranch suffers third natural disaster in a year

New abattoir opens in Pitt Meadows

Milk producers keeping an eye on free fatty acids

Cool season puts corn varieties to the test

BC members added to national youth council

Peace producers engage in on-farm research

Growth implants deliver big returns

Katz a keeper

Cannabis creates jobs for lean ranch operation

Post-harvest soil sampling yields input insights

Cranberry field day showcases Vasanna variety

Chilliwack tour showcases farm automation

Chilliwack blooms as Canada’s chrysanthemum capital

Grape grower has a passion for perfection

Plethora of pumpkins

Rural communities see surge in farmland sales

Farm Story: Crops prevail in spite of challenges

Woodshed: Kenneth seeks some advice on real estate

Day at the Farm delights visitors from the city

Jude’s Kitchen: Have a squish squash, very berry Thanksgiving

More Headlines

Follow us on Facebook

Comments Box SVG iconsUsed for the like, share, comment, and reaction icons

4 days ago

The Great Spallumcheen Farm & Food Festival and North Okanagan Plowing Match is happening this Sunday, September 24 from 10-3 at Fieldstone Organics, 4851 Schubert Rd, Armstrong. The outdoor festival features tastings and a market brimming with local food and beverage vendors, a horse and tractor plowing competition and vintage farm equipment displays. ... See MoreSee Less

The Great Spallumcheen Farm & Food Festival and North Okanagan Plowing Match is happening this Sunday, September 24 from 10-3 at Fieldstone Organics, 4851 Schubert Rd, Armstrong. The outdoor festival features tastings and a market brimming with local food and beverage vendors, a horse and tractor plowing competition and vintage farm equipment displays.
View Comments
  • Likes: 8
  • Shares: 1
  • Comments: 1

Comment on Facebook

Patti 😊

7 days ago

... See MoreSee Less

View Comments
  • Likes: 4
  • Shares: 0
  • Comments: 0

Comment on Facebook

7 days ago

The top five issues the Canadian Centre for Food Integrity identified in a recent survey were the cost of food, inflation, the cost of energy, keeping healthy food affordable and the Canadian economy. “We are seeing that environmental concerns are not in the top 10,” says Amy Peck, manager of the Canadian Cattle Association’s public and stakeholder engagement program. “If you are concerned about being able to afford to feed your family, the environment becomes less important.” ... See MoreSee Less

Link thumbnail

Ranchers get the backstory on public perception

www.countrylifeinbc.com

VERNON – Ranchers might be concerned about how the public sees their industry, but a producer-funded team at the Canadian Cattle Association has their back. Amy Peck, manager of the Canadian Cattleâ...
View Comments
  • Likes: 3
  • Shares: 0
  • Comments: 0

Comment on Facebook

1 week ago

BC Tree Fruit Co-op has sold its Lake Country packing house as part of its long-term plan to consolidate operations. The sale, to an undisclosed buyer, closed on August 31, 2023 for $15.8 million. ... See MoreSee Less

Link thumbnail

Lake Country packing house sold

www.countrylifeinbc.com

BC Tree Fruit Co-op has sold its Lake Country packing house as part of its long-term plan to consolidate operations. The sale, to an undisclosed buyer, closed on August 31, 2023 for $15.8 million.
View Comments
  • Likes: 7
  • Shares: 1
  • Comments: 5

Comment on Facebook

Who bought it ffs ?

Ted Nedjelski Karen Turner

One of my first jobs was apple grading in a packing plant in Vernon

Vivian, is this where you worked?

I’d hear the company that owns the big Cannabis company that owns the green houses all around this packing plant was buying up everything around to expand. Wonder if it’s them that got it.

View more comments

1 week ago

The federal government has committed $1.81 million over the next three years to support the BC Poultry Association's preparation for direct participation in responses to future outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in the province. “The persistence of the virus in wildlife and recurrence of outbreaks globally, presents additional risks during the migratory bird season in North America later in 2023,” the National Collaborating Centre for Environmental Health in Vancouver advised in July. For more, visit www.countrylifeinbc.com/ai-risk-rises-with-fall/ ... See MoreSee Less

The federal government has committed $1.81 million over the next three years to support the BC Poultry Associations preparation  for direct participation in responses to future outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in the province. “The persistence of the virus in wildlife and recurrence of outbreaks globally, presents additional risks during the migratory bird season in North America later in 2023,” the National Collaborating Centre for Environmental Health in Vancouver advised in July. For more, visit https://www.countrylifeinbc.com/ai-risk-rises-with-fall/
View Comments
  • Likes: 2
  • Shares: 0
  • Comments: 0

Comment on Facebook

Subscribe | Advertise

The agricultural news source in British Columbia since 1915
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Chilliwack tour showcases farm automation

Better quality, better efficiency drive tech adoption

September 28, 2022 byPeter Mitham

CHILLIWACK – A better quality product with fewer workers was the common rationale for the adoption of technology at four agri-food businesses showcased during a recent tour Chilliwack Economic Partners Corp. hosted.

The day-long event September 9 treated more than 50 representatives of government, business and the media to tours of Dutch Heritage Greenhouse, which specializes in cut chrysanthemums; Brooknook Farms, a robotic dairy operation; MolsonCoors, whose Chilliwack brewery uses local water and hops; and Canadian Organic Feeds.

The businesses had made significant investments in their operations over the past three years, and the tour was a chance to show off the latest technology and other innovations.

MolsonCoors, which relocated its brewery to Chilliwack in 2019 from Vancouver, offered the best example of how technology is helping it do more with fewer people.

Just six of the brewery’s 100 workers brew the plant’s annual production of 100 million litres of beer. Based in a control room off the main production floor, the workers monitor signals coming from the stainless steel vats where the malt is soaked, fermented and ultimately pumped into a high-tech “flavour kitchen” for final adjustment before canning.

The majority of workers are employed in the packaging and distribution operations, themselves highly automated production lines that can fill 1,200 cases a minute.

“Everything’s automation in this brewery,” said Wenji Liu, brewery team lead.

Samples undergo regular analysis, verifying that brewing systems are delivering a consistent product. Samples are sent monthly to MolsonCoors’ corporate lab for further testing.

The brewery is situated on land excluded from the Agricultural Land Reserve to accommodate uses related to agriculture and food processing.

However, MolsonCoors also chose the site because of access to clean water and local hops. With the revival of the local hop industry in the mid-2000s, Molson began sourcing hops from the Sartori property in Lindell Beach. Now, it uses hops from several properties in beers distributed coast to coast.

Water, meanwhile, is managed like a precious resource. The brewery has invested $2 million in landscaping that requires minimal water use, among other conservation measures.

“I like to use water for beer, and that’s it,” quipped brewery general manager David Hamel.

High efficiency

Water is also tightly managed at Dutch Heritage Greenhouse, which collects rainwater for use in its state-of-the-art greenhouse completed in 2019. Twice the size of its previous facility, it was built with automation and efficiency in mind. This extends to water use.

“We have a silo that collects rainwater, and also an irrigation ditch outside that collects rainwater. So in this greenhouse, even though we’re constantly irrigating, we actually use less than the annual rainfall,” co-owner Lukas Breugem told the tour.

Water and resource conservation is also in play at Brooknook Farms, where Mark Ricka showcased an expansion completed last year. Purchased in 2015 with a view to making the leap to robotic milking, the dairy keeps close tabs on milk quality. While the DeLaval robots gather information on individual cattle and send alerts to Ricka, the dairy also employs simple strategies such as pre-cooling milk to ensure freshness and save energy in the bulk tank.

During the precooling process, heat transfers from milk to water destined for the hot water boiler, reducing the energy requirement there, too.

The final stop on the tour, Canadian Organic Feeds, showed off its new feed mill built in the former Agropur plant on Yale Road. Purchased in 2017, the former butter and ice cream plant was converted and three-ton silos handling seven feed ingredients were erected.

Overseen by owners Darren and Jen Jansen and three workers, the roller mill can be programmed for a specific grind at a set time. Grains can be milled overnight, for example, so workers can prepare mixes the next morning.

This has made for an efficient operation that distributed to farms as far east as the Kootenays as well as through local businesses including Otter Co-op.

Building on the dairy’s former retail operation, the feed mill has opened an ice cream parlour in response to locals who didn’t want to lose their favourite hangout.

Chilliwack MLA Dan Coulter, representing the provincial government, noted that technology was a common element helping each business adapt, and underscored the BC NDP’s support for agritech promoting as part of its economic strategy.

“Agritech is going to become an ever more important part of agriculture,” he said.

Related Posts

You may be interested in these posts from the same category.

Chilliwack showcases farm automation

Previous Post: « Plant health centre breaks ground
Next Post: Strong growth for farmland values »

Copyright © 2023 Country Life in BC · All Rights Reserved