Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, April 2, 2024 – The Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network (CAAIN) today unveiled the fifth story of an eight-part series highlighting results of the AgTech research & innovation projects it has funded through its 2022 Open Competition and its Beef & Pork Primary Processing Automation & Robotics Program.
CAAIN’s mandate from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) is to fund technological responses to the most significant opportunities and challenges facing the nation’s agri-food producers and primary processors. That means supporting promising efforts with the potential to provide economic or environmental value. The featured stories demonstrate that CAAIN is doing just that, as does investing in 35 projects with a combined total value of approximately $100M.
“We typically fund our projects once,” explained Darrell Petras, CAAIN’s CEO. “Occasionally we make an exception, as we did in this instance. When GeoAI submitted their initial project proposal in 2021, they laid out a roadmap alerting us to their need to break the project into three phases. They have done as promised, and delivered tremendous results in advancing this important technology. Despite the grain sector’s massive contribution to Canada’s economy, grading has remained essentially unchanged for 100 years. Dr. Zeng and his team are providing much needed modernisation.”
Phase 2 of GeoAI Platform for Automating Manual Observation Associated with Wheat Production has CAAIN contributing $711,586 of the second stage’s $2,171,259 total value—a worthwhile investment in light of the grain industry’s $20B annual contribution to our GDP. What is particularly gratifying for Mr. Petras is the cross-pollination of projects that will soon have GeoAI collaborating with another Saskatoon-based CAAIN project partner, VeriGrain Solutions. “CAAIN is first and foremost a network,” he said. “Seeing two of our project leads cooperating and leveraging our investments is immensely gratifying, and validates both our approach and our choice of agtech initiatives.”
For more information, read the story online.
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The Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network (CAAIN) is a not-for-profit company launched in July 2019 with funding of $49.5‑million from the Government of Canada’s Strategic Innovation Fund, and assistance from Alberta Innovates in the form of significant in-kind contributions. CAAIN drives collaborative agri-food technology research and innovation from coast to coast.
| Project Funding Inquiries Darrell Petras, P.Ag. CEO Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network darrell.petras@caain.ca |
Media Inquiries Eric Morin, CMP Manager, Communications and Marketing Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network 780.405.3742 | eric.morin@caain.ca |
