Chia: a new crop for organic production in Québec

Description

Because of its high omega content, chia is one of the foods that we now call "super food" or functional food. Chia, as an opportunity crop, can help make organic farms more diversified and profitable. This two-year project, conducted at the Organic Agriculture Innovation Platform, compared the effect of three seeding dates and three seeding rates on chia yields. Pests and diseases that could damage the new crop were also monitored. The project included an evaluation of production costs and an analysis of the economic and technical feasibility of growing chia.

Objective(s)

  • Determine the potential of chia as a crop in Québec
  • Test the feasibility of using early-blooming chia varieties developed in Kentucky,
  • Identify best cropping practices
  • Conduct a technical and economic analysis to check whether this crop would be profitable in Québec

From 2015 to 2018

Project duration

Field crops

Activity areas

Organic farming

Service

Québec-grown organic chia could attain yields exceeding those in Argentina.

Partners

Growing Forward 2 | Ministère de l'Agriculture, des Pêcheries et de l'Alimentation du Québec - Innov'Action Programme | Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada | Agri-Fusion 2000

This may interest you

2015-2016 • Field crops

Climate extremes and fertilizer efficiency in organic grain crops

A literature review, a survey of organic grain producers, and an analysis of historical yield and climate data in order to document the effects of climate extremes on yields and soil nutrient availability.

Researcher: Marc-Olivier Gasser

Read more about the project

Marc-Olivier Gasser
2016-2018 • Field crops

Promoting undersown clover cover crops in small grain production: A network of farm demonstration plots across Québec

Demonstration project to showcase the ability of undersown clover cover crops to reduce nitrogen fertilizer requirements in crops.

Researcher: Marc-Olivier Gasser

Read more about the project

Marc-Olivier Gasser
2018-2019 • Field crops

HebdEau: a pilot project to develop sound irrigation management decision-support tools

This project looks to develop decision-support tools informed by observations of “bellwether” plots and use these tools to disseminate relevant information to irrigators.

Researcher: Carl Boivin

Read more about the project

Carl Boivin