By Vijay Jayaraj
As we gaze at the verdant fields of Saskatchewan or the salmon-rich waters of British Columbia, it’s easy to forget that merely 12,000 years ago much of Canada lay under miles of ice.
The Canada we know today—a mosaic of thriving ecosystems and bountiful farmlands—is the product of a remarkable transformation that began as the last glacial ice advance waned and the warm embrace of the Holocene’s interglacial period took hold.
Birth of Canadian Agriculture
Beginning about 11,000 years ago, the warmth of the Holocene and the receding of massive continental glaciers enabled people to farm. Humans transitioned from nomadic hunter-gatherer societies to more sustainable lifestyles with permanent settlements.
North America was no different, with Canadian flora and fauna thriving in the newfound warmth. Studies on the spatial and temporal pattern of climate change through the Holocene in Arctic Canada show the temperature profile to be quite complex, following changes at the global level.
In fact, much of northern Canada endured a scary Little Ice Age in the 1500s, threatening to submerge again the continent’s vegetation under ice. Thankfully, the Earth returned to warming naturally by the 1700s.
The 20th century in particular saw considerable warming that has had profoundly positive impacts on Canada’s landscape and agricultural potential.
This recent rise in temperature has pushed the boundaries of arable land northward, extending growing seasons and opening new possibilities for cultivation. Crops like corn that were once considered impossible to grow in many parts of Canada are now thriving.
“Warmer temperatures and longer frost-free seasons could increase productivity across the board, but especially in northern regions and southern and central Prairies,” reports Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) of the Canadian government. Additionally, it ensures higher rates of survival for young animals while reducing the cost of energy and livestock feed.
This climatic shift — combined with man-made increases in atmospheric CO2 concentrations that boost plant photosynthesis and with advances in agricultural technology — has contributed to a doubling of the size of the average Canadian farm in the last 50 years.
Better Growing Conditions Allowed for Diverse Crops
While traditional staples like wheat barley, and canola remain important, they’re now joined by an impressive array of products like world-class apples, cherries and wine grapes in the Okanagan Valley and melons in Newfoundland.
According to the data from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Canada is now the world’s largest producer and exporter of lentils — a niche crop made popular in agrarian Canada by South Asian migrants. Experimentation with new crops and techniques has been a driving force behind Canada’s growing agricultural diversity and productivity.
The latest AAFC report says, “Production of all principal field crops (in 2024-2025) is estimated to have increased 1.8% year-over-year, which would be 2.4% above the previous five-year average.”
Higher rates of crop production mean more efficient animal husbandry. Despite the disruption of exports due to the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease) between 2003 and 2015, the export value of Canadian beef and veal more than tripled between 2013 and 2022.
The gross production value from agriculture is expected to almost double between 2018 and 2028. The annual growth of agricultural production value in the five years will be one of the highest.
Even those who subscribe to a fallacious apocalyptic vision of climate change acknowledge that “Canadian regions that were previously limited by shorter growing seasons may find new opportunities for agriculture, such as double cropping or cultivating crops that were not viable before.”
That human civilization has benefited immensely from warming of the last century and in earlier Holocene periods is undeniable. This reality is quite noticeable in Canada as areas once unsuited for farming are now some of the most productive in the world.
Canadian farmers are thankful for the longer growing season and the greater abundance of atmospheric carbon dioxide that better feeds plants. So should the rest of us. After all, Earth is nearing the end of its current interglacial period and the resurrection of mile-thick glaciers in coming millennia, according to the pattern of geological history.
This commentary was first published at Toronto Sun on October 13, 2024.
Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Arlington, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Duh. My tomatoes in my greenhouse are still setting fruit. Everything growing outside is done and gone.
My turnips outside are maturing nicely. Brussels Sprouts mature from now until Christmas. Leeks continue to grow into mid November. Warmer temperatures stretch the length of the growing season, as does making the last frost earlier and the first frost later. It’s never going to see rapid growth outdoors, all year round, at 50N in the UK, however.
Pembrokeshire has made a name for itself for ultra-early potatoes, since its lands close to the sea can be planted in January and harvested in time for Easter. It’s like the Scilly Isles and the Channel Islands.
Well, some locations are good.
In the midwet coast of Canada, brussels sprouts can be harvested at least twice a year.
But much is imported from California and Mexico where they get more crops per year of many vegetables.
Yes, by fossil fuel powered trucks.
But you use bad stuff (natural gas)? 😉
The Canadian government is trying to shut farmers down because of warming fears over emissions.
The enormous opportunity for agricultural production to benefit mightily from natural warming across Canada is in danger of being wasted by moronic restraints on fertilizers.
This at a time when it is estimated that in 2050 and beyond, in order to feed the world’s population, the total amount of food being produced globally every year will have to be as much as was produced in the entire period since mechanized / chemically fertilized agriculture began.
We’re gonna need a bigger hothouse!
How does this factor vs widespread concern of a population implosion?
Dunno ORG.
But I suspect that any diminished growth in developed western populations will be more than overtaken by much higher positive growth in undeveloped populations all around the world.
Headlines from World Grain.org.
Birth rates are falling world wide. Almost all the growth till 2100 will be due to those already born reproducing, and very few will have more than 1-2 children. SubSarhan Africa is just about the only place with significant population growth.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN
Good job. Same potential applies to the much larger area of Russia, but they are too messed up to take much advantage
Russia is the largest producer and exporter of various grain products, due to extremely fertile soil in the southwest
That soil continues into Ukraine (which was a part of the Russian Empire since about 1700), also a large exporter of various grain products
Doesn’t the land area that is getting weather that allows productive farming much larger than what is becoming unusable? Canada and the land mass of Eurasia are massive.
“what is becoming unusable”
Is any place becoming unusable ?
Except from stupid regulations ?
Why do you say such rubbish about Russia? Russia made a huge play in agriculture as soon as the US started forcing sanctions upon them. Go look up the figures if you don’t believe me…..
As I gaze at the soggy streets of London I wonder why this warming insists on passing us by?
Soggy Hunter Valley too.. could do with a reasonable stint of no rain.
God’s revenge on Khan and the LibLabGreenCon?
1. More rain is not a problem.
2. Warmer weather is not a problem.
3. More arable land is not a problem.
4. Longer growing seasons is not a problem.
5. CO2 greening of the earth is not a problem.
6. There isn’t any Climate Crisis.
Warmer is Better. Fight the Ice.
I’m not a fan of Autumn or Winter. Some are. I like Spring and Summer. Of course, our Southern globe types experience the opposite seasons. Here in the Pacific Northwest, Fall is mostly wet. This October has been quite wet.
Is it wetter than “normal”?
I’m sure California would happily accept some of your rain. Theirs has been extremely arid.
Not in NE Washington State. Approx. 1/8-inch of rain in the last 80 or 90 days. (We had a very long hot Summer & Fall, so far.)
but… but… the governor of Wokeachusetts says we’re having a climate emergency! All state government agencies push this fantasy- on all their web sites.
That’s all generally true, but incessant autumn rain makes harvesting late potatoes very difficult for big farmers, as their machines get stuck in mud. The same can be said for carrots, leeks and other mass harvested crops.
Warmer weather can reduce productivity of some crops whilst enhancing that of others markedly.
The rest, I agree with you.
This is awful news, since that means the life of the planet is in greening time a disease that needs to be Orange 10enned out of existence or the angry hordes are of warmist/alarmist ecoloonies will descend into the region with their printed posters and scream rape of the planet because we are using it for the greater good that can’t be tolerated as they want everyone to become miserable leftist stools they already are.
“miserable leftist stools”
Stools… and not the kind you ever want to sit on !
Like on a Los Angeles street.. never ask, “pardon me, are you using this stool?”
Don’t forget, a warmer and wetter climate can mean more bugs, which insectavores, birds in particular, really enjoy.
Warm and wet is great for dwarf beans, french climbing beans and runner beans. Great for fennel, courgettes and squash, celery and .
Cool and wet is great for potatoes, leeks, spring turnips, early beetroot.
Coolish and dryish is great for carrots, parsnips and the like.
Warm and dryish is great for tomatoes, cucumbers, corn and the like.
Very informative Vijay.
The warming climate is hardly beneficial only to Canadian agriculture. The UN’s FAO has pointed out that during the past half-century food production globally has tripled. a major factor in the doubling of the Earth’s population. Except the climate alarmists don’t want to concede anything like this; instead, they insist on claiming that rising temperatures will impede agricultural production leading to food shortages and declining population even if the facts refute their assertions.
Vijay Jayaraj yet again presents a clear indictment of the futile Green Alarmist fight against the evident benefits of the present global warming and the beneficial emissions of CO2
I don’t think many Canadian farmers are planning on moving North to those new “warmer climate areas”…maybe the stats show a longer growing season but the killing frosts and the end of season depends mostly on the length of daylight, not to mention those early and late frosts strike quite randomly from one year to the next due to cloud cover and jet stream variations.
Quicker maturing crops and shorter varieties of grains that don’t lay flat in that unexpected early snow, plus granular fertilizer made from natural gas, not atmospheric CO2 increases, herbicides, and pesticides are what have made the Canadian Prairies prolific crop producers. And diesel fuel to run the big equipment that gets the crop seeded faster and earlier…
One of the claims of the activists is that the corn belt would move north to the less fertile lands of Canada in a warming world. That’s nonsense, of course. Since corn is a tropical plant and the seed producers can anticipate the change in climate, the corn belt will actually EXPAND north.
“Knee high by the fourth” (of July) was the rule of thumb for a good corn crop, at least in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Growing up in Northern Minnesota, we never did get a “good” sweet corn crop. It was too cold. I now winter near the fertile plains of South Texas. Here the rule “Knee high by the fourth” could still apply to the abundant corn crops, but it would refer to March, not July. Corn is often growing quite nicely by then, sometimes leaving ample time for a second crop. A longer growing season will help that.
Seems Vijay is a true believer.
…..combined with man-made increases in atmospheric CO2 concentrations ….
It’s a pretty obvious statement to make that if the world gets 2-3C warmer, then agricultural productivity will go up in Canada, Scotland, Ireland, Russia, Sweden and the like.
The question is where it might actually go down outwith pragmatic alterations to agricultural practice?
When I hear nutters in Scotland claiming that a 2C warming will ‘threaten food security in Scotland’ I laugh my head off. Average summer maxima where I live in NW London are 6C warmer than in much of the Scottish agricultural belt (23C vs 17C in July and August) and I have zero problems whatsoever in growing high yields of up to 30 vegetables.
If climate warms by 2C, then growing optima for various crops will simply move 200 miles or so north. The question is what happens to the Sahara and places like southern Spain, southern Italy and Greece. And what options do such places have to retain soil fertility and productivity?
Well:
Edit button does not work, so I add here:
‘Yield’ per acre depends on: