International Rural Exchange promotes agriculture at home and abroad

Jun 13, 2023

The heart of the International Rural Exchange (IRE) has always been agriculture and facilitating relationships.

Farmers started it as a solution to find workers for their fields in 1985, and it has turned into an act of fostering international relations.

Executive director Anita Warriner started with the IRE as a host, welcoming young adults from all over the world to her and her husband’s farm. It wasn’t until 2009 that she took over in the running of the IRE, moving it to its current location in Alameda.

“It’s all about connection with the host and bringing people into Canadian culture, bringing them to community events. If people use them as cheap labour it doesn’t work,” Warriner shared. “This develops good and close relationships, if the host can be patient with the English and training, it’s incredibly enriching.”

At the IRE there are two halves of the same coin, inbound and outbound. For inbound, over 200 young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 come into Canada on a work permit and are hosted on a farm.

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Six hundred Canadian farms grow grain for Warburton's under custom contract — and that partnership exists because of Canadian plant breeding. Now the man responsible for maintaining it is sounding the alarm.

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