Thanks to new government funding, it will be easier for farmers in British Columbia to be more innovative.

The Government of Canada and the B.C. government recently announced an investment of more than $4.5 million to support agricultural producers and processors who want to develop new products, create new processes and reach new markets.

The funding is part of the federal-provincial Growing Forward Agreement, in which government and industry are collaborating on a number of initiatives, including the $2.04 million Innovation and Commercialization Centre. The centre will be a one-stop agricultural information resource promoting product development within industry by linking businesses and other organizations with service and technology suppliers.

Other Growing Forward initiatives focus on:

• Encouraging the development of high-efficiency, low-waste manufacturing processes.
• Helping producers and processors identify and realize opportunities for biomass use in bioenergy and nutraceuticals.
• Creating enhanced B.C. product quality assessments.
• Fostering the development of premium products and niche markets.
• Planning a series of agriculture innovation forums to foster collaborative science, policy, and marketing action plans and strategies.

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