ONTARIO GRAIN FARMER MARKET DEVELOPMENT 11 continued on page 12 A COLLABORATIVE EFFORT What sets market development in Canada apart from other jurisdictions are efforts among different commodities and their provincial and national grower organizations. Nationally, Cereals Canada and Soy Canada represent wheat and soybean valuechains, respectively, including Ontario growers through the Grain Farmers of Ontario membership in those organizations. The collaborative effort amongst these groups lends itself to continued diligence where market development is concerned. For instance, Grain Farmers of Ontario conducts an annual wheat harvest survey across all four of its classes, with intensive milling and baking tests. It brings that insight to domestic millers – to compare what they're seeing at their mills – and then in tandem with Cereals Canada, works to promote those quality insights to international millers to try to build new demand in an attempt to create new markets. Soy Canada runs a quality lab in conjunction with the Canadian Grain Commision. Grain Farmers of Ontario supports with funding and participates in Soy Canada's trade missions. Ontario growers benefit from insights garnered from those missions, including demands of Japanese markets or work with researchers and plant breeders. “We tend to punch above our weight as a provincial group and we’re very involved in international market development work,” says Dickerson. “Part of it is because we’re the largest production region for soy, so we're very involved with Soy Canada. We only grow about eight per cent of Canada’s wheat but 85 per cent of Canada’s winter wheat, so we’re engaged in helping Cereals Canada promote that class.” Ontario’s also the largest production region for corn with more than 60 per cent of the country’s crop. Although there’s Soy Canada, there isn’t a Corn Canada, and corn doesn't fall under Cereals Canada. “We do a lot of leadership with corn and promote its priorities and support market development issues.” It's a lot of engagement with trade missions abroad: Dickerson notes there have been ongoing efforts to maintain wheat milling with Mexico plus recent initiatives with Europe, Ecuador, Columbia, the Dominican Republic and Nigeria, now Ontario’s fourth largest export market. Then there are similar missions – inbound and outbound – with Japan, Taiwan and China for soybeans. Some buyers are interested in commodity beans at the lowest prices while others, like Japan, have specific quality and culture-related standards. A ‘GREAT NEWS’ STORY As attractive as those far-flung markets and buyers may seem, the U.S. remains an important market for Canada and particularly for Ontario, something Josh Boersen understands. A farmer from the Stratford area, District 9 (Perth) director and a board member with Cereals Canada, Boersen agrees with Dickerson’s view that the U.S. remains a vital trading partner and history leans towards maintaining that status. A research paper from Dalhousie University in June 2025 underscored that value, with bilateral trade in agri-food with the U.S. worth $72.6 billion in 2023 – roughly $1.4 billion per week. “We're beholden to what happens there,” he adds. “With cereals, there is a bigger concern, especially for Ontario. There might be secondary markets in Mexico and recently we've been doing more missions into Latin America and Mexico specifically to highlight our cereals and target those markets, and there's good reception for our products.” On the other hand, he notes that what took 50 years to build is not going to shift significantly in the short
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