The Executive Director of Manitoba Pulse and Soybean Growers (MPSG) is looking back on a good year for producers.
Daryl Domitruk made the comments during his year-end interview.
"I think you could classify 2020 in terms of our annual legume crops, the dry beans, the peas, and the soybeans, as a successful year. I think it would be, in light of 2019, 2020 was a good year and I think overall it would be considered a good year across the last couple of decades."
In Manitoba, soybean production rose 3.6% in 2020.
"It was a good year, so that the per acre yields were up over 2019 but of course the overall acreage in Manitoba was down and that decline was, we believe, in response to the previous couple of seasons where some intense drought reduced yields in soybeans and so growers responded by planting fewer acres, but those acres that did go in, and it was not a small crop, it still was in that 1.2 million acre range, which is a pretty substantial acreage in Manitoba. Those that did go in, did rather well in 2020."
Domitruk is looking ahead to 2021 with a lot of optimism.
"The Roquette plant at Portage, and also the Merit operation in Winnipeg, both together are strong signals of some of the market potential that's developing in yellow peas and in other sources of plant protein. Both companies will be providing growers with another marketing option. The thing about the pea industry is that it's really supporting the reintroduction of peas into the rotation in Manitoba."
He notes the interesting thing about these crops is that we grow them unlike anyone else in the world. Soybeans are generally grown in rotation with corn, we grow them in rotation with half a dozen other crops. Peas are grown in drier western regions of the Prairies, we're trying to grow them back here in a more humid part of the Prairies. Domitruk says we have a really Manitoba set of circumstances that MPSG is very aware of and are learning about every year.
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