SIA 2025 Convention and Annual General Meeting:
From the Ground Up – Exploring the Foundations of Sustainable Agrology
On March 18 and 19, more than 300 agrologists from across Saskatchewan will gather online to enjoy a variety of innovative presentations discussing the current issues related to agrology in Saskatchewan. The annual event brings together professionals from the agricultural, food, bioresources, and environmental sectors. The two-day event will feature educational sessions, the SIA’s 79th Annual General Meeting, and the annual Honours and Awards presentation.
Notice of Annual General Meeting
The SIA Provincial Council invites you to join them for the 79th Annual General Meeting on March 19, 2025 at 1:30 pm.
This event will be held ONLINE at no cost.
*Articling Agrologists and Articling Technical Agrologists must attend all sessions to count the convention and AGM as a milestone.
Click here to register today!
Schedule
March 18, 2025 |
Speaker | Session Title |
9:30 am to 9:45 am | Welcome & Opening Remarks | |
9:45 am to 10:45 am | Paul Galpern PhD, University of Calgary | What if we stopped seeding unprofitable acres? Win-wins for profitability and sustainability in Prairie Canada. |
10:45 am to 11:00 am | Break | |
11:00 am to noon | Jeff Schoenau PhD, PAg, Usask College of AgBio | Strategies to address “problem soils in Saskatchewan” |
Noon to 12:30 pm | Break | |
12:30 pm to 1:30 pm | Kevin Elmy PAg, Cover Crops Canada | Designing cover crop blends to build soil health |
1:30 pm to 1:40 pm | Break | |
1:40 pm to 2:40 pm | Patty Smith, Ag Social |
Harnessing the power of social media to build your personal brand |
2:40 pm to 2:50 pm | Break | |
2:50 pm to 3:50 pm | Lyle Cowell PAg, Nutrien | Managing marginal saline land |
March 19, 2025 | Speaker | Session Title |
9:30 am to 9:45 am | Welcome & Opening Remarks | |
9:45 am to 10:45 am | Helen Baulch PhD, Usask School of Environment & Sustainability | Balancing drainage benefits with environmental and social effects: a conversation starter |
10:45 am to 10:55 am | Break | |
10:55 am to 11:55 am | Bobbi Helgason PhD, PAg, Usask College of AgBio | Digging deep to learn about soil carbon storage from hillslope erosion-buried soil |
11:55 am to 12:30 pm | Lunch Break | |
12:30 pm to 1:30 pm | John Pattison-Williams PAg, University of Alberta | The importance of wetlands |
1:30 pm to 1:40 pm | Break | |
1:40 pm to 3:15 pm |
SIA’s Honours & Awards Presentation
|
Speaker and Session Details

Balancing drainage benefits with environmental and social effects: a conversation starter
Helen Baulch PhD, USask, School of Environment and Sustainability
About the Session: Prairie landscapes are typified by productive agricultural lands, dotted with wetlands. These wetlands can have a cost to agricultural productivity, while concurrently bringing different societal benefits. In this talk, I will discuss key challenges associated with drainage spanning from differences in our individual understandings of drainage effects, and scientific assessment which predicts important, but variable impacts of drainage on the environment, including water quality. We’ll talk about mitigation options, and return to the importance of dialogue in coming to common understandings about drainage, mitigation, and management in our agricultural landscapes.
About the Speaker:
Helen’s work focusses on water security and water quality in the prairies, spanning land management and water management. Her recent work has included a focus on both biophysical impacts of drainage, and social dimensions. Her group has also helped highlight pragmatic options to better manage phosphorus for agronomic and water quality benefits. Helen’s work spans to aquatic ecosystems impacted by high nutrients and changing climate, studying the cycling of nutrients within lakes, impacts of blooms within lakes, and adaptation and mitigation needs related to broad water uses, including drinking water. She lives in Saskatoon, working as an Professor and Centennial Enhancement Chair at the University of Saskatchewan School of Environment and Sustainability and Global Institute for Water Security. Helen has received multiple honours through her career for her teaching and research, including an appointment to the Royal Society of Canada College of New Scholars.

Strategies to Address “Problem” Soils in Saskatchewan
Dr. Jeff Schoenau PhD, PAg, USask, College of AgBio
About the Session: This presentation will first define and describe “problem” soils as they exist in the prairies. Means to restore productivity of these soils are then covered ,including building soil organic matter, fertility, and addressing adverse soil chemical and physical conditions. Strategies examined include changing crop type and adjusting cropping system, utilization of soil amendments, livestock integration, and associated challenges and benefits. Research examples are brought in to demonstrate efficacy and impact.
About the Speaker: Dr. Jeff Schoenau PAg is a professor of soil fertility and professional agrologist who works in the Department of Soil Science at the University of Saskatchewan. He holds the Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture Soil Nutrient Management Chair in the College of Agriculture and Bioresources. He was born in Saskatchewan, completed his undergraduate and graduate degrees in the 1980’s in the College of Agriculture at the University of Saskatchewan and has worked there since. His research, teaching and extension activities deal with soil fertility and fertilizers, nutrient cycling, and soil management practices in prairie cropping systems. He also farms with his spouse Lynne near Central Butte, Saskatchewan).

Sloughs, Pasture and Bush:: Nature-based Climate Solutions in Agriculture
John Pattison-Williams PAg, University of Alberta
About the Session: There is growing interest in applying “nature-based solutions” in the agricultural sector to address climate change. Using examples from farms in Alberta and Saskatchewan, this presentation will explore what nature-based solutions are, why they are important and how they can be useful for both farmers and society at large. Specifically, this work will highlight grassland and wetland ecosystems, and the carbon sequestration that could be 16 achieved through conservation (securing existing carbon stocks) and restoration (creating new carbon 17 stocks) of freshwater mineral soil wetlands on agricultural landscapes the conservation of wetlands. Economic insights will be provided and personal farming insights will emphasize these insights.
About the Speaker: Dr. John K. Pattison-Williams is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Alberta and president of Pattison Resource Consulting Ltd., a company specializing in the interaction between environmental conservation and economic development. John is a Professional Agrologist and Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society. He is also the Principal Investigator of a national grassland hub of learning hosted at the University of Alberta. He farms and lives in the Miquelon Lake area, raising grass and blue roan quarter horses with his spouse and two boys.

Designing cover crop blends to build soil health
Kevin Elmy PAg, Canada Cover Crops
About the Session: What constitutes a “good” cover crop blend? Depends on goals. Weeds control, nutrient cycling, water infiltration, livestock feed, and the list goes on. Our soils are not being managed in a way they were created, and we see production issues. Cover cropping is one of the ways to restore soil functionality and get the liquid carbon pathway flowing.
About the Speaker: We purchased land and moved back to the family farm in 1999. After seeing the state of the dirt I purchased, I realized we needed to get life back into it, turn it to soil. We started changes in management in 2000, what now is known as regenerative agricultural practices, we started with cover cropping in 2007. In 2010, I started holding meetings across Western Canada educating producers regenerative agriculture principles and the use of cover crops. I now work with producers across Canada, into the United States and Australia. The principles are the same, soils act similarly. We need active carbon in them to allow them to function.




Managing Marginal Saline Land – Problems and Solutions
Lyle Cowell PAg, Nutrien
About the Session:
There are several soil factors that can limit annual crop production in Saskatchewan but the dominant problem remains soil salinity. This is a natural problem in our landscape that cannot be easily ‘fixed’ with any product. The key remains with management of subsoil water, and the understanding that this land can only be productive and the spread of salinity limited if the farmer takes measures to use or remove the subsoil water. Certain forages are the most effective tool, coupled with an approach to variable land management. This session will focus on how salinity develops and through case studies demonstrate that these ‘marginal’ lands can make the whole farm more profitable.
About the Speaker: Lyle Cowell is the Senior Canadian Agronomist with Nutrien Wholesale and supports the agronomy and sustainability of the N, P, K and S fertilizers that are manufactured by Nutrien. His previous career was as a regional agronomist in northeast Saskatchewan where he extended agronomy research to the farm gate.
Lyle has always had the goal of connecting good research, sound soil fertility principles and agronomy extension to honest farm gate advice.
What if we stopped seeding unprofitable acres? Win-wins for profitability and sustainability in Prairie Canada
Paul Galpern, University of Calgary
About the Session: Not all acres are created equal—up to 10% of prairie fields may be unprofitable year after year. By combining precision yield data, satellite imagery, and machine learning, we can map and predict long-term risks to profitability, helping farmers make informed land-use decisions. Our free mapping tool will reveal where unproductive acres could be converted into forage grasses, saving money and supporting sustainability. Data from hundreds of fields, we have studied, already shows that “messy” fields with unfarmed spaces support natural enemies and pollinators, leading to a measurable “halo effect” that increases crop yields. Join us to see how making fields messier might make farming more sustainable, profitable, and resilient: one field at a time!
About the Speaker: Dr. Paul Galpern is an Associate Professor at University of Calgary where he leads the Agriculture, Biodiversity and Conservation (ABC) Lab. His research team studies sustainable agriculture in prairie croplands. He is also co-PI on the Prairie Precision Sustainability Network (PPSN) which uses precision agriculture data to identify profitable opportunities to convert farmed land to forages. The PPSN team is working across Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba to support farmers to convert unprofitable acres, and studying the effects these have for farming operations. He believes that both agricultural and sustainability objectives can be achieved at the same time, and that such “win-wins” are well within reach in Prairie Canada.
Harnessing the Power of Social Media to Build Your Personal Brand
Patty Smith, Ag Social
About the Session: A short description – Social media tools represent a great opportunity to grow your business by building your on-line reputation and personal brand. In this discussion we will focus on foundational principles to maximize your social media footprint and how to promote the practice of agrology to your targeted audiences.
About the Speaker: Patty Smith is the co- founder of AG Social with Ashley Drummond. Patty lives on a farm with her husband, Shawn, near Nokomis, Sask. She has spent her entire career involved in the ag industry working at independent ag retail, and before that with a global crop protection & biotechnology manufacturer and a grain & agribusiness company. In addition to her work, she enjoys competing in cutting horse shows, livestock shows and sales, spending time with her Border Collie kids, traveling, and writing.
Digging deep to learn about soil carbon storage from hillslope erosion-buried soil
Bobbi Helgason PhD, PAg, Usask College of AgBio
About the Session: Description: Hillslope erosion was prominent when intensive tillage and summer fallow were commonplace in cropping systems. Now, decades later, we have been studying the soils that water and tillage erosion buried to learn about microbial soil carbon cycling and how these erosion events redistributed carbon in the landscape. We’ll discuss how these buried soils are helping us to understand carbon cycling at depth in the soil profile and at the same time are teaching us about basic principles of the conversion of easily available to stable carbon in different soil types.
About the Speaker: Bobbi’s research aims to understand microbial soil processes of nutrient turnover and carbon cycling. Her research team studies how plant-soil-microbe interactions can be optimized through various management approaches to increase nutrient use efficiency, build healthy soils, and support plant productivity. Bobbi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Soil Science at the University of Saskatchewan.