Commodity Groups Target National GPS Strategy

CANADA - Farm-Scape: Episode 1335. Farm-Scape is a Wonderworks Canada production and is distributed courtesy of Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork.
calendar icon 4 September 2003
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Manitoba Pork Council


Farm-Scape is sponsored by
Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork

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Farm-Scape is a Wonderworks Canada production and is distributed courtesy of Manitoba Pork Council
and Sask Pork.

Farm-Scape, Episode 1335

Several commodity groups have joined forces to develop a national approach to the use of global positioning systems to catalogue farm production buildings across Canada.

A Canadian Pork Council survey, last year, of all of the provincial governments looked at geographic information systems across Canada.

The study prompted several commodity groups to join forces and, this week, they are due to name a consultant who will begin the development of a national GPS standard.

CPC Agriculture Policy Analyst Eric Aubin says the study showed a need for a more coordinated approach.

"We came to the conclusion that the information collected was not harmonized and sometimes not complete or not upgraded. One of the reasons for this is that there is not a national template for geo-referencing the premises.

Because their are a lot of mixed farms in Canada, we wouldn't like to do geo-referencing separately by each commodity group so we're looking at a multi-commodity approach. This the reason the CPC is working in cooperation with the Canadian Animal Health Coalition, the Canadian Cattle Identification Agency.

One of the first tasks of the consultant will be to study what has already been done in certain provinces.

For example Ontario Pork, Dairy Farmers of Ontario, the Ontario Cattlemen's Association and the Canadian Cattle Identification Agency have conducted geo-referencing initiatives.

The consultant will have to look at what they've already done and make sure the template suits what they've done so they won't have to do major corrections to their systems."

Once complete, data base will become a component of a national system for tracking livestock movement.

Aubin says it's hoped all commodity groups will be sensitized to the need for geo-referencing livestock premises to improve Canada's foreign animal disease preparedness.

For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

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