The Nutrient Management Program was a collaboration of farmers, agronomists, the University of Manitoba, and the Prairie Organic Grain Initiative. The program was created to address the need for a better understanding of green manure and fertility management. The initial desired outcome was to enable farmers to make better decisions about green manures. However, as the program evolved, other outcomes emerged.
This project resulted in fifty-two farmer participants and fourteen agronomist
participants. Farmers got valuable information about their farm (plant, soil, harvest, nutrient
budget), agronomists were trained, and the U of M got valuable feedback on their tools. We
feel that we were able to reach our overall objective to increase information flow, assess on farm nutrient budgeting, and broaden the concept of the co-design model across the Prairies. We learned that having agronomists do on farm visits and work together with farmers on a codesign approach was effective and valuable, and, in some cases, resulted in a change of management. Having the training from the U of M and a framework to work within helped the agronomists work effectively with the farmers. (Read the Full Report)
