Surrey/Abbotsford – The Province of BC announced a new B.C. Centre for Agritech Innovation. The announcement was in Abbotsford and the Centre will be in Surrey.
Billed as to further position the province as a world leader in agricultural technology, helping to improve food security in B.C. and around the world, while creating hundreds of good-paying jobs.
A key commitment of the StrongerBC Economic Plan, the new centre will be located at Simon Fraser University’s (SFU) Surrey campus. The centre will bring together academia, government and industry partners (known as the triple-helix model) to create more productive, diverse and resilient food-supply chains.
“The past two years have been challenging ones for British Columbians as the pandemic, climate-related emergencies and global conflicts have disrupted supply chains and raised the cost of food,” said Ravi Kahlon, B.C.’s Minister of Jobs, Economic Recovery and Innovation. “Launching this BC Centre for Agritech Innovation will improve productivity here in B.C., meaning more food will be grown closer to home, leading to lower costs associated with transporting food. Simply put, this centre makes us a global front-runner in agritech.”
The Province is investing as much as $6.5 million over three years for the centre, while the federal government is providing as much as $10 million over five years through Pacific Economic Development Canada (PacifiCan).
The centre, which will officially open in September, has begun taking applications from small and medium-sized agritech operations throughout the province. The centre will focus on developing, testing and piloting solutions in simulated and real-world environments to be farm-ready for commercialization. Key components of the centre will be to create economic opportunities for Indigenous Peoples and help small and medium-sized agritech businesses scale up, increase profits and create good-paying jobs.
