Canada Lifts Drone Spray Curbs, Spurring 100-Litre Farm Trials as $100 Billion Exports Lag
Updated
Updated · CBC Sports · Aug 23
Canada Lifts Drone Spray Curbs, Spurring 100-Litre Farm Trials as $100 Billion Exports Lag
1 articles · Updated · CBC Sports · Aug 23
Summary
Health Canada’s late-June approval of pesticide-spraying drones has triggered a surge of farmer interest, highlighted by a DJI T100 demonstration on Dean Roberts’s 4,000-hectare Saskatchewan farm.
The 100-litre drone could let growers spray fungicide when wet fields keep ground rigs out, addressing a regulatory gap that farmers say left Canada behind the U.S., China, Brazil, Japan and Australia.
That technology push comes as Canada’s agri-food exports total about $100 billion a year but lose global share: RBC said the country fell from fifth to seventh among food exporters and its share has dropped 12% since 2000.
Farmers and advisers say faster approvals alone will not lift output unless rail bottlenecks, port access and labour shortages ease, especially when Prairie crops depend on roughly 1,500 kilometres of rail to tidewater.
The broader debate is whether Canada should simply expand exports or position itself as a more sustainable food power, as climate change may boost Canadian production while other countries pursue greater self-sufficiency.