The Rural Voice, 1990-02, Page 39NEW
MARKET COULD CHANGE FARM PRACTICES
A new alfalfa plant should give farmers a good return
on their crop while encouraging stewardship
DIAN AGRA
£HYDRATION AND CUBING PLANT
Canadian Agra's alfalfa dehydration and cubing plant near Kincardine, Ontario will process 6,000 acres of pure alfalfa
in 2 dryers this year. That figure will rise to 40,000 when all 12 dryers are in operation. Trucks will enter theplantand
be weighed on a computer scale on the ramp on the left. The alfalfa will be taken by elevators to the sorting table before
being fed into computer -controlled dryers. The drying cycle for directly harvested alfalfa will be 30 to 35 minutes based
on 80 to 85 per cent moisture. In good weather conditions, the alfalfa will be swathed and left 3 to 5 hours in the field,
which will reduce moisture to 60 to 65 per cent and reduce the drying time. The temperature in the dryers is 300 degrees
Celsius, which causes less protein and colour damage than in dryers operating at temperatures of 800 or 900 degrees.
The alfalfa cubes themselves will be about 1 by 2 or 21 /2 inches, and will be either bagged or shipped in bulk. Before leaving
the plant, trucks will weigh out on additional computerized scales.
Doug Fletcher, business relations
officer for Canadian Agra, sees the
company's new alfalfa plant at the
Bruce Energy Centre near Kincardine,
Ontario as a way to revitalize local
agriculture, in more ways than one.
The $15 -million plant, which will
begin operation in May, will take in
6,000 acres of pure alfalfa in 1990,
and in subsequent years expects to
process 40,000 acres into dehydrated
and cubed alfalfa, primarily for export
markets.
And if 5 tonnes per acre is an
achievable yield for alfalfa, farmers
can expect, at $35 a metric tonne,
$175 gross revenue per acre per year
— with no harvest or transportation
costs, as Canadian Agra will be har-
vesting the crops it contracts for.
When the plant is at full capacity,
Fletcher adds, 40,000 acres of alfalfa
will mean $7 million in gross revenue
for the targeted growing area, a 15 to
25 -mile radius around the Bruce
Energy Centre.
As a bonus, Fletcher says, farmers
in Bruce County, hit by the declining
beef industry in the region and forced
into more cash -cropping, can use
alfalfa in their rotations and aim for a
10 to 20 per cent yield increase in the
other crops in their rotations.
"We see alfalfa not as a displace-
ment crop," Fletcher says, "but as a
rotational routine. The alfalfa option
will be competitive enough to use in
standard rotation." And good rota-
tions will also improve the quality of
the local land base. There is a need to
put some grasses and alfalfa back into
the local rotational system, Fletcher
says.
Fletcher notes that non -intensive
alfalfa cropping produces an average
yield of between 3.3 and 4.5 tonnes
per acre over a three to five-year
period. But intensive management in
more southerly cropping areas has
produced yields of up to 8.5 tonnes
per acre. "With a bit of care, 5 and
5 1/2 should be an achievable figure,"
Fletcher says.
Canadian Agra will be buying on
36 THE RURAL VOICE