On Thursday, September 13th, the Kamloops Agriculture Advisory Committee hosted a Kamloops Farm Tour in order to facilitate a better understanding of the local commercial agriculture industry in order to help guide the development of a City Agriculture Area Plan. This community engagement event is one of several more to come that will be included as part of Agriculture Area Plan Development Process.
The tour, of approximately 60 people representing various agencies including, but not limited to, Interior Health, the First Nationals Agricultural Association, the Ministry of Agriculture, Venture Kamloops, Community Futures, TNRD, City staff and Council, Thompson Rivers University and Agri-Foods and Olympic Legacies, aimed to educate participants on the challenges and opportunities of local commercial farming operations, trends of the industry, and the successes and failures of different sectors of Kamloops agriculture. The tour included presentations by Dhaliwal Green Acres Vegetable Farm, Thistle Farm, Frolek Cattle Company and Blackwell Dairy. Lunch was provided by Terra Restaurant, a Kamloops eatery that uses locally or regionally grown products as available, funded by Community Futures Thompson Country.
Gary Rolston, Professional Agrologist, of ‘From the Ground Up’ in Courtenay noted that, according to a model developed by the BC Ministry of Agriculture, it takes 0.524 hectares to feed one person, of which 10% must be irrigated. “Kamloops needs close to 45,000 hectares of land to be fully food self-sufficient. There isn’t that much land available within the boundaries of the City. This is why Kamloops should be looking to support and encourage agricultural development in the larger region.”
In addition, the average age of BC farmers continues to climb, and without new generations stepping in to take over, this poses a very real threat to local farming enterprises. More and more produce is transported from the US and Mexico. While farmers markets provide a great opportunity to source local products and raise awareness about local food, the distribution and wholesale processes in the province leave costly inefficiencies. “We need to be able to sell our produce in local stores. Local produce is shipped to large central warehouses at the coast and then shipped back to the large stores in Kamloops”, said one local farmer. The first step to dealing with these issues is awareness, and the tour helped to generate this, as well as potential future partnerships for local agricultural support.
Participants left the tour with a better understanding of the industry, and recognized the need to protect the area’s resources, such as land and water, and to sustain and expand the local agriculture industry.
“Although we will always have to bring in food from around the world, local food supplies provide the consumer a healthy “ripened-on-the-vine” alternative,” said Jeremy Cooke, of AC Eagle Enterprises, a local consulting firm.
“This tour helped us to raise awareness and educate people about local food sustainability issues, which will be reflected in our Agriculture Area Plan process as we move forward”, said City Planner, Maren Luciani. “We are hearing loud and clear that there needs to be more flexibility in terms of regulations for bonafide farmers and a better municipal support system for the industry. This tour not only helped to flush out the issues facing farmers but also generate discussion surrounding some of the potential solutions to these issues.”
“We can easily transition some of our agricultural lands back into horticultural production. We have the soil and climate to grow food crops instead of just hay,” stated Robson Rogan, Professional Agrologist for Purity Feeds, a local agricultural supply company that caters to both local and regional farmers.
Councillor Nelly Dever concluded, “We need to build partnerships between the City and the agricultural community in order to help mitigate the challenges facing the industry.”
To stay connected with the Agriculture Area Plan visit the City of Kamloops Agriculture Area Plan webpage at www.kamloops.ca/environment/land-agricultureplan.shtml