An innovative research center at the University of Saskatchewan (U of S) will bolster their expertise in agricultural technologies thanks to an investment of over $1.3 million from the Government of Canada.

The Honourable Ralph Goodale, Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, made the announcement on behalf of the Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development and Minister responsible for Western Economic Diversification Canada.

The Global Institute for Food Security (GIFS) will receive more than $1.3 million for the creation of the Omics and Precision Agriculture Laboratory (OPAL), which supports state-of-the-art precision agriculture using high-throughput digital phenotyping of crops integrated with genomics data and analysis expertise. Precision agriculture processes and products developed by OPAL will be clean technologies that can improve crop yields and quality, while mitigating negative environmental impacts and over-use of valuable resources like soil nutrients and water.

Precision agriculture is a key component to ensuring that the Canadian agriculture sector continues to boost production capacity and crop nutrition, while maintaining and building a prosperous economy for the future.