Skip to main content

“I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.” ~~ John G. Diefenbaker

ADAM OLSEN -- They were a highly effective, ultra-short-term solution. They killed everything, pest and predator, laying waste to the natural environment, and devastating entire eco-systems


My Championing Local Business tour has opened my eyes to a wide range of enterprise in Saanich North and the Islands. I have visited facilities manufacturing heavy industrial equipment for logging and marine ports, boat building and repairs, food processing and research and development in a variety of fields. Clearly, my riding is home to a vast array of expertise.

As it turns out, we are also home to world-leaders in beneficial arthropods. My meeting with Brian Spencer from Applied Bio-nomics, at his North Saanich greenhouse facilities, reminded me of being a kid in our own greenhouses. The science behind growing, storing and shipping parasitic wasps and predatory midges is complex yet the premise is simple - figure out how nature works naturally and then encourage more of it.


Nature does it better
The idea of controlling pests with their natural predators goes back as long as humans have been engaged in agriculture. Even though agricultural practices alter the landscape, hedgerows are an example of natural insectaries, home to valuable natural predators of pests that love to feast on the food produced for human consumption.

However, I grew up in the 1970's, 80's and 90's and my family business was horticulture. I remember times when we were not allowed into the greenhouses because we had an aphid problem. Instead of deploying an army of naturally occurring aphid predators to seek and destroy their prey, we sprayed chemicals.

The rise of chemicals
The Second World War was a turning point for the chemical industry. Up until the 1930’s, insectaries like Applied Bio-nomics supplied natural weapons for farmers. However, following the war, chemicals became the primary tool for pest management.

They were a highly effective, ultra-short-term solution. They killed everything, pest and predator, laying waste to the natural environment and devastating entire eco-systems causing many unpredicted consequences throughout the inter-connected web of life.

Even more problematic is that, much like antibiotics for humans, efficacy decreases over time. Some of the pests will survive the chemical attack, then they reproduce, making the chemical compound obsolete and fuelling another round of chemical innovation.

It's a vicious cycle that lays waste to nature and poisons our food supply.

Leading the world
Canada is a leader in the research and development of harnessing the power of nature for pest management and Applied Bio-nomics on the Saanich Peninsula is at the forefront of the industry. Through the federal government Scientific Research and Experimental Development Tax Incentive Program they have been able to develop our understanding by growing a massive population of the pest, to encourage the production of the predators. Then they catch, store and ship them for application in agricultural greenhouses and fields around North America and the world.

The chemical industry made big promises. It's easy, available and is sold as conventional agricultural practice. Health Canada determines products like glyphosate are safe for humans but we are not the only part of nature to be concerned about.

Unfortunately, the more you use chemicals, the more you need to use chemicals. However, because of innovators like Applied Bio-nomics, we don't have to rely on the chemical industry to create evermore complex chemical concoctions.


It's exciting to see the work of Applied Bio-nomics reconnecting us with what we always knew.

Nature has a solution.

If we get out of the way and watch, we can learn how to harness its power. The work Brian and his crew are doing in North Saanich is one important part of ensuring we have a safe and healthy supply of food in a rapidly changing world and climate.



Adam Olsen ... is a Green Party Member of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia for Saanich North and the Islands. Born in Victoria, BC in 1976, Adam has lived, worked and played his entire life on the Saanich Peninsula. He is a member of Tsartlip First Nation (W̱JOȽEȽP), where he and his wife, Emily, are raising their two children, Silas and Ella.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

GORDON F. D. WILSON: When The Trick Masquerades as The Treat

Thirty-seven years ago, Halloween 1987, I became the leader of the BC Liberal Party.   British Columbia was badly polarized. Social Credit held one side and the NDP the other. It had been twelve years, 1975, since Liberal MLAs Garde Gardom, Pat McGeer, and Alan Williams had walked away from their party to join Social Credit, one year after the lone Progressive Conservative MLA Hugh Curtis had abandoned his party to sit with Bill Bennett, the son and heir apparent to long-serving BC Premier, WAC Bennett.   An unwritten agreement by the biggest Canadian political shareholders, the federal Liberals and Conservatives, decided that if British Columbia was to remain a lucrative franchise from a revenue perspective, they couldn’t risk splitting the electoral vote and electing the real enemy, the NDP, so no resources would be used to finance either a Liberal or Conservative party provincially.   “There are two sides to every street,” I was told by a very prominent Canadian businessman who cont

FORSETH: You Have To Be A Bit Crazy

  Ward and his wife Carleen celebrating his win on election night.   In March of this year, I took on the role of Campaign Manager for BC Conservative candidate Ward Stamer.  It’s the third time I’ve had the opportunity as I took on the role for Peter Sharp in 2013, and for Dennis Giesbrecht in 2020. Now let me tell you, in the past, a BC Conservative campaign team generally consisted of myself, the candidate and one or two helpers – and very little in the way of a campaign budget. Thankfully, a benefit of having spent 30+ years in the broadcast media afforded me the ability to do ad copy and write candidate speeches, and prep both Dennis and Peter to deal with the media – it’s also something I have always enjoyed. That was part of my duties this time around as well, however having a team of a dozen and a half volunteers meant that for the first time we had people available to ID our supporters, put together and install campaign signs, distribute campaign literature, and help out at ou

Rustad will support policy for 'everyday' people, otherwise work to bring down NDP

  Conservative Party of B.C. John Rustad Tuesday (Oct. 29) said his party would support government policies that support "average, everyday working" persons in B.C., but also repeated earlier promises to bring down the B.C. NDP government under Premier David Eby. "If there are things that are moved forward that will improve lives for those people, we would be looking at support it," Rustad said. "But if he's going to carry forward with the destructive policies that he has, then yes, we are going to look at every opportunity possible to bring him down as soon as possible."  CLICK HERE for the full story

Labels

Show more