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Olds College partners with TELUS Agriculture

Dec 04, 2020

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The partnership increases the college’s applied research capabilities

By Taryn Milton

Staff Writer

Farms.com

Representatives from Olds College and TELUS Agriculture recently announced a $1-million partnership.

The newly formed TELUS Agriculture is investing into the college, allowing the two to work closely together, said Stuart Cullum, the president of Olds College.

Olds College is “able to be a living lab to test, develop and scale some of the technology that (TELUS is) involved in. Also, we'll benefit from some of the technology that they're able to bring forward that provides the foundational layer that allows us to establish our Smart Farm and really provide a tremendous applied research environment for industry and for producers to work together on,” he told Farms.com.

The investment provides funds to support technical staff and components for the 2,800-acre Smart Farm and builds on the connectivity that enables data flow on the farm, said Cullum.

“We're able to work with not only TELUS, but the 50 other partners that we’re already engaged with on the Smart Farm to develop, scale and test technology, at commercial scale, across our 2,800 acres and within our feedlots and our livestock operations,” he said.

The partnership also helps producers and the ag industry in Alberta and Western Canada continue to tackle the challenges and new technology coming out. This also puts students at the cutting edge of learning, said Cullum.

“It's a great learning environment for our students. We're very excited about the work that we are doing with industry to provide these kinds of applied research and learning environments. I think it's critically important, not only for agriculture sector to continue to advance with technology, but for our next generation of graduates and learners to be able to be exposed to those kinds of environments,” he said.

Video: Seeing the Whole Season: How Continuous Crop Modeling Is Changing Breeding

Plant breeding has long been shaped by snapshots. A walk through a plot. A single set of notes. A yield check at the end of the season. But crops do not grow in moments. They change every day.

In this conversation, Gary Nijak of AerialPLOT explains how continuous crop modeling is changing the way breeders see, measure, and select plants by capturing growth, stress, and recovery across the entire season, not just at isolated points in time.

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This conversation explores:

• What continuous crop modeling is and how it works

• Why traditional field observations fall short over a full growing season

• How scale and repeated measurement change breeding decisions

• What “digital twins” of plots mean for selection and performance

• Why data, not hardware, is driving the next shift in breeding innovation As data-driven breeding moves from research into real-world programs, this discussion offers a clear look at how seeing the whole season is reshaping value for breeders, seed companies, and farmers, and why this may be only the beginning.