Page 53 - 03-May-2024

as a better way forward for farming in general. “He’s running a business, but
he still sticks to his guns on what he believes will be best for the environment,” says Sara Mah, a University of Alberta crop science student and recent Rosy Farms intern.
It’s not just a principled stance, she adds, it’s practical. “I think there is going to be a shift to working with what’s best for your soil.” With the rising cost of inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides, says Mah, “it will have to happen because it will be just too expensive to be con- ventional at some point.”
Rosychuk would see any such additives as detracting from the health benefits of his product anyway. Those grapes, raspberries and blueberries are not unhealthy; the latter also qualifies as
a “superfood.” But even a blueberry doesn’t compare to a haskap for levels of a particular nutrient that sets a high standard in healthiness. Antioxidants are superhero molecules that battle inflammation, fight for heart health and
“He’s running a
business, but he still
sticks to his guns on
what he believes
will be best for the
environment.”
— Sara Mah, a University of Alberta crop science student
protect against cancer – and haskaps are full of them. The Ainu people of Japan, where the plant also grows naturally, refer to the fruit as “the elixir of life.”
But regenerative agriculture isn’t
the only way Rosychuk is working to maximize those benefits. This year, he’s planning for an onsite 40-by-60-foot
food-processing facility. That’s a fraction of the size of the modern large-scale plant to which he otherwise has to
send berries, knowing that nutrition deteriorates over distance. But his will be big enough to clean, grade, freeze and pack what isn’t plucked by u-pick customers for sale within Alberta through wholesalers, retailers and farmers’ markets.
To help feed his tiny haskap factory, Rosychuk will plant another 8,000 to 9,600 bushes this summer, making Rosy Farms one of Alberta’s largest haskap orchards. But, just as it will take time for those new plants to reach full potential, it will take time to make their fruit a supermarket mainstay. Rosychuk won’t rush that at the expense of the Earth. Profit is a product of patience: like waiting for a groundcover to grow in, for deer to get the pruning done,
for the barn swallows to return each spring.
In the meantime, he says, “you’re doing it because you love it.” ED.