Saskatchewan Agriculture Scholarship Winners Announced

May 12, 2020

Saskatchewan Agriculture Minister David Marit awarded four scholarships to Saskatchewan students pursing an agriculture-related education.

“Each year the submissions to the Agriculture Student Scholarship Program show how passionate the province’s youth are about the agriculture industry,” Marit said. “These young people show how bright the future is for agriculture in Saskatchewan.”

Mackenzie Van Damme from Imperial received $4,000 toward her agriculture-related post-secondary studies as the 2020 grand-prize scholarship winner. Van Damme’s submission highlighted the importance of agriculture in her community, the evolution of her family’s grain farm and the unique opportunity producers have to connect with consumers.

“I appreciated the opportunity to share my food story and highlight the positive impact agriculture has in our community,” Van Damme said. “It’s important to help consumers better understand the work and passion that goes into producing food and I’m thankful I was able to do my part.”

Marci LeBlanc of Estevan, Isobel Kinash of Wishart and Makenzie Olson of Tisdale received scholarships of $2,000 each.

The Agriculture Student Scholarship Program identifies young people who are advocates for agriculture and leverages their passion and ability to tell the story of Saskatchewan agriculture. This scholarship is funded through the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, a five-year $388 million investment in strategic initiatives by the federal and provincial governments.

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.