Farm of the Future
2021
YEAR 1 REPORT

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McCAIN’S REGENERATIVE FARM OF
THE FUTURE CANADA
Farming and agronomy are at the heart of McCain Foods.
Which is why we are prepared to have a frank discussion about the future of farming.
Against a backdrop of an ever-growing population, changing weather, soil degradation
and biodiversity loss, the future of global food systems is under pressure. We are on
a journey to produce more planet-friendly food, and to get there we committed toimplement regenerative agricultural practices across 100 per cent of our global potato
acreage by 2030.
This means re-imagining the way we grow potatoes within the farming ecosystem, andthat is exactly what we are doing with our Farms of the Future project.
We are investing in these commercial scale farms to increase the agronomic andeconomic resilience of our potato cropping system. It is where we are marrying modern
technology and equipment with advanced farming practices and current scientificknowledge of ecological and agricultural principles to farm in a holistic way. By 2025,
McCain will have three Farms of the Future operating in different growing regions
around the world. The first, located just outside McCain’s hometown of Florenceville,New Brunswick, in Canada, had its first fully operational season in 2021.

ABOUT FARM OF THE FUTURE CANADAThe McCain Farm of the Future Canada is located at 53 Waugh Road, Riverbank, NewBrunswick. Overlooking the St. John River, it sits just south of Florenceville town centre
and is in close proximity to the McCain airstrip and Highway 130 for easy customer andgrower visits. Farm of the Future Canada owns 500 acres — 360 acres of cultivated landand 140 wooded and non-productive — and is renting an additional 160 acres on longterm basis.

OBJECTIVES
The potato industry is facing many challenges including productivity loss, increased
input cost and changing weather patterns. The regenerative practices and innovativetechnologies introduced at Farm of the Future Canada aim to address these challenges
of modern agriculture. In order to meet these challenges, Farm of the Future Canada is
implementing McCain’s principles of regenerative agriculture that focus on improving
soil health, including:Armouring soils —preferably withliving plants

Minimizing soil
disturbanceEnhancing cropand ecosystem
diversity

Reducing agrochemical impact

Optimizing wateruse

By adopting these principles of regenerative agriculture, Farm of the Future is creatinga path to a more sustainable, financially stable and environmentally conscious future forour growers. The Farm of the Future team is committed to transferring this knowledge
to our growers so that they can have confidence in the economic and environmental
business case for the adoption of these regenerative practices where appropriate on
their own operations. Knowledge transfer requires grower engagement, which has been
initiated at the farm through our first Field Day in summer 2021.
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SUMMARY OF THE REGENERATIVE PRACTICESThe regenerative practices implemented in the first year of operation (CY21) at Farm of the Future Canada aresummarized in Table 1. Most of these practices were straightforward and easy to implement. The most challenging
practices included livestock integration, rotational grazing, and the controlled traffic farming system. Quantification ofimpacts of these practices is ongoing and will be communicated to growers going forward.
Table 1. Summary of practices implemented in CY 2021 at Farm
EASE OF IMPLEMENTATIONSTRAIGHT FORWARD

MODERATELYCHALLENGINGCHALLENGING

Sustainable Ag Practices
Moldboard plowing to conservation plowing

Y

Fall beddingY

Cover Cropping

Y

Strip Cropping

Y

Green ManureY

Y

Animal Integration & Rotational Grazing

Y

Absence of FumigationY

Row Spacing

YY

Machinery & Equipment
Seed Sizing

Y

Controlled Traffic Farming
Dammer Diker

YYTechnologyDecision support system - pest and disease

YPrecision Ag - Soil Optix® | Productivity Zones

YA BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF REGENERATIVE
AGRICULTURAL PRACTICES
Multispecies cover crop for green manuring
Multispecies cover crops were planted on over 160 acres (Picture 1). These typesof cover crops are not only eye-catching but provides multiple benefits compared tosingle specie cover crop. In CY21, Farm of the Future Canada planted a total of 28 crop
species in different fields to enhance biodiversity and regenerate soils. These crop
species included nitrogen fixing legumes such as alfalfa, frosted berseem clover, redclover, faba beans, birdsfoot trefoil, black forage peas and chickling vetch. Warm andPicture 1. Annual multispecies
cover crops
cool season grasses such as pearl millet, sorghum sudan grass, japanese millet, corn,timothy, arsenal meadow grass, brome grass, meadow fescue, oats, annual andperennial ryegrass and orchard grass. Plant species from the mustard family such as brown mustard, fodder rape,
groundbreaker radish, kale, oilseed radish and purple top turnip.
Other species included were phacelia (Borage family), buckwheat (Knotweed family) and sunflowers (Sunflowerfamily).
All of these species providing a number of benefits including:
1. Maximizing the amount of organic matter returned to the soil as green manure to feed the soil food web andincrease soil organic matter.
2. Improving water infiltration thus decreasing risks of water run-off and soil erosion.
The reduced run-off or soil erosion was observed in the fall 2021 following intense
precipitation where cover crops were planted.
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33. Increasing the nutrient cycling by allowing different root types, root systems and root structures to extract
nutrients at different depth of the soil profile making them available for the subsequent crop.
4. Fixing nitrogen that will be available to the subsequent potato crop.
5. Removing soil compaction.
6. Decreasing the risks of soil borne-pest and diseases such as verticillium wilt and nematodes or suppressingweeds.
During our first year of operation, active green plants and roots covered Farm of the Future Canada soils for anaverage of 181 days. The rest of the time, crop residues from these cover crops prevented soil erosion.

Fall bedding and seeding cover crops
Fall bedding in combination with planting cover crops is not a common practicein New Brunswick or in other regions across North America. The introductionof fall bedding allowed Farm of the Future Canada to reduce tillage andsuccessfully establish cover crops prior to the onset of winter. The cover crops
seed mixture was seeded using an APV Air Seeder mounted on a basket hiller
as a one-pass operation during the first week of September 2021 (Picture 2).
Oats, brown mustard and buckwheat were seeded, although buckwheat did
not establish well. However, oats and brown mustard established really well
(Picture 3). These crops are not anticipated to overwinter; however, the plant
residue left on the surface of the soil will provide an excellent cover to protect
against soil erosion.

Picture 2. The APV air seeder for seeding
cover crops.

We anticipate planting potatoes directly in the beds in spring without
additional tilling. The soil residues will also improve water infiltration in thespring. The seed cost of planting oats at 30 lbs/acre and brown mustard at
4 lbs/was around $30 per acre. In one of the fields, fall rye was also planted
as cover crop at 60 lbs/acre (seed cost $53 per acre). The objective was tocompare the value of these different cover crops.
Different management strategies will be investigated on how to best
Picture 3. Farm of the Future Canada Field J3:
Prepared fall beds and seeded cover crops
terminate the fall rye cover crops in spring. The benefits of fall bedding along
during the first week of September. Photowith planting cover crops include removing the need for inversion tillage
taken October 23.
(moldboard plow) in the fall and reducing the need for spring tillage prior toplanting potatoes. Other benefits include reduced fuel consumption, soil compaction and soil erosion during the off
season (fall, winter and early spring) as well as to increase our ability to improve soil organic matter and reduce soilborne pests and disease pressure in the potato crop.

Controlled traffic farming system and other practices
We successfully implemented a number of practices including CTF that will reduce soil compaction, soil erosion andtillage intensity. CTF is a farming system built on permanent wheel tracks, also called tramlines, where the crop zone
and traffic lanes are permanently separated (Picture 4). A fundamentally important component of our CTF plan is GPS
steering on our in-field equipment. We utilize a Raven GPS system with an RTK signal for sub-inch accuracy. The
implementation of CTF at Farm of the Future Canada means that our plant spacing arrangement is slightly different
than in a conventional planting system (Picture 5). In the CTF system, potatoes are planted in 4-row beds, each row
spaced at 30 inches from one another. To accommodate for the wheel track (tramline) necessary in this system,
the distance between the outside rows of adjacent beds is wider (43.9 inches), for an effective row spacing of 33.5
inches on average. To take advantage of the extra space between each 4-row bed, seed pieces in the outer two rows
(rows #1 and #4) were planted at a higher density (tighter spacing) than the middle two rows (row #2 and #3). For
example, two ounce Russet Burbank seed was planted at 16 inches in the outer rows and at 17 inches in middle rows.
This plant spacing arrangements was designed to maximize light interception and photosynthesis allowing for greaterlight use efficiency boosting potato yield.
Other practices include chisel ploughing (Picture 6), basket hiller and dammer diker (Picture 7). A number of newtechnologies were also implemented including seed sizing prior to planting, decision support system for late blight
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4management and precision agriculture technologies (GPS RTK for sub- inch accuracy, variable rate planting, satellitebased remote sensing and soil mapping technologies).

Picture 4. Controlled traffic farming system

Picture 5. Row distances 30 and 44 inches

Picture 6. Chisel plough

Picture 7. Basket hiller with dammer-diker

Livestock integration and strip grazing
Farm of the Future Canada also experimented with integrating livestock on the farm. The objective of the livestock
integration was to incorporate manure without having to transport and spread it, which allowed for a more evenapplication of manure by controlling the movement of cattle in the field. Livestock integration in cropping systems has
the potential to increase production on cultivated lands and foster resilience and adaptation to climate change without
proportional rises in environmental influences. We implemented strip grazing; a type of rotational grazing that involves
confining livestock to a strip with fresh pasture for short periods of time (1-3 days). Strip grazing allows managing
pastures by alternatively grazing and resting to allow regrowth of the grasses. At the Farm of the Future Canada, amovable fence in a linear orientation controlled the grazing area available to cattle.
Cattle were brought to Farm of the Future Canada from two local cattle producers. Annual and perennial pastures
were established for the purpose of having cattle present on the farm for as long as possible and also to allow for agreen manure incorporation in an annual pasture system prior to potatoes. Annual pasture seed blend included fast
growing species such as black forage pea, berseem clover, pearl millet, Japanese millet, oats, conventional seed corn,
groundbreaker radish, kale, purple top turnip, buckwheat, and sunflowers and planted on June 9, 2021. Perennial
pastures included arsenal meadow bromegrass, meadow fescue, orchard grass, birdfoot trefoil and half a rate of redclover. Red clover rate was reduced to half to prevent cattle bloating as this field was previously planted with alfalfa.
No fertilizer was applied in these fields.

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CROP PERFORMANCE
Potatoes
Total yields at harvest of Russet Burbank, Caribou Russet and Innovator were estimated at 394 cwt/acre (44 t/ha),
440 cwt/acre (49.4 t/ha) and 412 cwt/acre (46 t/ha), respectively. These yields are in line with the estimated New
Brunswick’s average yields of 411 cwt/acre (46.1 t/ha) for Russet Burbank, 386 cwt/acre (43 t/ha) for Caribou Russet,and 394 cwt/ acre (44 t/ha) for Innovator. Farm of the Future Canada’s final payable yields and full quality assessment
along with crop economics will be reported in next year’s report, as all potatoes have not been delivered to thefactory. The partial delivery data is showing the crop has good color, gravity and acceptable tuber size.
Fertilizer use in all three varieties at the Farm of the Future Canada was slightly lower than average fertility rate in
the area. This reduction was mainly in the amount of Phosphorous and Nitrogen used. Fertilizer for Russet Burbank
was banded at a rate of N185-P90-K120 pounds per acre at planting. Additionally, 105 pounds per acre of potassium
was broadcasted as a variable rate in fall 2020, based on SoilOptix® analysis (cost $25/acre). Innovator was bandedwith N200-P81-K130 pounds per acre at planting and Caribou Russet was with N175- P85-K114 pounds per acre atplanting. Additionally, potassium was broadcasted in fall 2020. Optimizing fertilizers rates can lower cost and reducegreenhouse gas emissions.

Barley and OatsBarley crop yield was good, averaging 1.4 metric tonnes/acre. However, high winds and heavy rains at crop maturity
induced heavy lodging in oats and only about half of the acreage was harvested. Oat fields were fertilized with N44P16-K47 pounds per acre and barley with N65-P24-K68 pounds per acre. Both oats and barley were underseededwith four perennial species (perennial rye grass, alfalfa, clover and timothy). Seed cost per acre for underseeded
plant species was $38.22. Underseeding the grain crops with perennial multispecies provides excellent soil coveragefollowing the cash crop, contributes to soil biology and should provide high quality green manure prior to potatoes.

ADDITIONAL PROJECTS IN CROP YEAR 2022
Farm of the Future team will implement number of new projects in2022, including:• Implementation of best in-class on-farm employee safety program.
• Installation of drip irrigation powered by solar renewable energy.
• On-farm composting using Johnson-Su bioreactor.
• Seed pollinator to enhance biodiversity: The pollinator seed mixes
to be planted along the field borders in the spring of 2022 include
timothy, alsike clover, red clover, birdsfoot trefoil, phacelia andcrimson clover (Picture 8).

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Picture 8. Photo of pollinator seed mix

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