SFGA 2022 Annual General Meeting

The SFGA Annual General Meeting was held on January 29, 2022 at 10:00 am on the Zoom platform (due to COVID, we did not meet in person).  Regular business and motions were made to approve previous minutes, approve the September 30, 2021 financial statements, election of Board directors, other business.  Reports were provided from Don Martin, SFGA President; Forrest Scharf, Fruit Crops Specialist, Sask. Ministry of Agriculture; Murray Lewis, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada; and Dr. Bob Bors, Head of the Fruit Program, U of S, Dept. of Plant Sciences.

Following the business portion of the meeting, we invited our two speakers, Reka Gajari from STEP and Dr. Bob Bors from the University of Saskatchewan, Fruit program to make their individual presentations.

1. Reka Gajari, Senior Market Intelligence Specialist with STEP (Sask. Trade & Export Partnership) delivered her talk addressing information on processing products for cross-border shipping.  STEP completed a guide on exporting agricultural products to the U.S. with 9 sections.  Reka focused on 2 sections of that report, being Customs & Logistics-Navigating the U.S. Market and US Regulatory Environment.  She also provided information on shipping produce province to province in Canada as per CFIA information.
2. Bob Bors, Assistant Professor, Head of the Fruit Program at U of S, Plant Sciences.  He teaches classes on Fruit Science, Plant Propagation, Greenhouse Management, Biotechnology, Urban agriculture and Introduction to Horticulture.   He runs the fruit breeding program which is breeding many hardy fruits, and is well known around the world for work on Haskap, Sour Cherries and Apples. Bob delivered his speech on “100 Year of Prairie Fruit Breeding”.  Breeding and research on fruit crops at the U of SK has been continuing for 100 years.  In 1921, the University of Saskatchewan hired Cecil Patterson , who had been trained as a fruit breeder, to teach horticulture classes.  The next year, a Department of Horticulture was created and land was allocated for horticulture breeding and research.   Many of our “new crops” have had decades of breeding in their history to make them hardy.  As time went on, goals changed, people changed, and fruits became more hardy and better tasting.  In some cases, breakthroughs were made in fruit breeding that surpassed what the rest of the world was doing.  Today, The U of SK program is among the northern most locations where fruit is being bred. We might be the coldest location in the world where apples and sour cherries are being bred by a major program. Bob also indicated they are also one of the few fruit breeding programs heavily involved in breeding for mechanical harvesting.