Three Fertilizer Challenge grants awarded in Lambton County

Lambton County is well represented among recent provincial Fertilizer Challenge grant recipients.

Sarnia-Lambton MPP Bob Bailey Thursday announced Petrolia’s SureSource Commodities LLC is receiving $200,000 from the province’s Agriculture Ministry to help with research into cricket frass fertilizer, relying on supply from the Aspire cricket-processing facility in London.

Two Alvinston companies are receiving similar sums for fertilizer innovation projects, as are companies in St. Thomas and Bothwell — meaning half of the 10 grant recipients via the Bioenterprise Canada-run challenge aimed at improving local fertilizer supply are in Southwestern Ontario.

Three are in Lambton County.

It’s a testament not only to the engineering and agricultural skill in the area, but the quality of the land, said Mohammad Rahbari, with BioLine Corporation in Alvinston that received $200,000 to help with formulating, commercializing and developing a folvic-acid-based bio- stimulating aimed at making crops less susceptible to drought.

“We are sitting on some of the best growing soil, essentially the best growing-crop lands we have in Canada, here in Southwestern Ontario,” he said.

“That convergence of agriculture and technology is probably why there’s been so many (local) recipients because there’s so many technology companies located in that Lambton-Middlesex area.”

There were 32 applicants in the $2-million-over-two-years program and other recipients were from Toronto, Grimsby, Guelph and New Hamburg, government officials said, noting Ontario relies on net international imports to fill about 36 per cent of its total annual fertilizer needs.

After the War in Ukraine in 2022 threatened to destabilize supply chains, the challenge was developed to reduce international dependency and safeguard domestic food supply, government officials said in documents provided through Bailey’s office.

“What the Canadian economy and the farm community want to make sure is they can source this stuff a lot closer to home,” Bailey said, noting the agri-food sector in Ontario in 2022 supported 750,000 jobs and contributed $47.6 billion to the provincial economy .

Bioenterprise Canada ran an open call for proposals last fall and all applications were reviewed by a panel of industry experts, government officials said.

Hopes are the challenge will return in the future, Rahbari said, praising Bioenterprise Canada and government officials for making it happen.

“I don’t know how they did it, to be honest,” he said. “It was a really fast turnaround.”

SureSource’s Rob Wallbridge similarly said it’s not a surprise to see Lambton well represented among grant recipients.

“Agriculture is obviously a huge part of the economy in the Lambton County area and there’s quite a history of innovation from farmers and other agricultural companies,” he said.

There’s been a market challenge in having enough fertilizers approved for organic use, he said.

“So with the creation of the new cricket facility in London, that gives us the opportunity to access a large volume of frass for fertilizer.”

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