Bugging out: Sask facility helps researchers plan for potential crop pests

The University of Saskatchewan (U of S) has opened a new research facility dedicated to inspecting insects.

Dubbed the U of S Insect Research Facility (USIRF), it is the first at a Western Canadian university to have quarantine capabilities, the U of S website said.

“It means that you can work with insects and plant pathogens that are not native to Saskatchewan,” USIRF research lead Sean Prager told CTV News. “And so you can do research that you couldn't otherwise do.”

Prager said the importance of the facility was to protect Canadian crops and plants.

“It lets you look at potential pests of crops before they've established in the province. And then it also lets you look at potential management techniques that might involve foreign organisms or genetically modified crops or something where you want to be careful to not have it accidentally get out until you were certain that it's a thing that would be usable and not a threat to the environment.”

The 500-square-foot facility is located in the Agriculture Building on campus and has been designed with Canadian Food Inspection Agency Plant Protection Containment level-2A requirements, the U of S website said.

Prager said the building was six years in the making, with some delay from the COVID-19 pandemic.

He said the facility would complement resources currently available in the area.

• Get the CTV News app for Saskatoon area breaking news alerts and top stories 

“We have the Crop Center, which means we have plant breeders who ideally would be able to implement and sort of leverage the information we gave them,” Prager said. “There's a direct connection where if we identify traits that you give plants resistance or tolerance to a particular pest, then we can pass that on to the plant breeders. They can then incorporate those into future varieties.”

He said the amount of agriculture in the province made the facility a good fit for Saskatchewan.

“We have a lot of agriculture in Saskatchewan and a large number of our pests are either migratory or are relatively new. So, because that's the case, you want to be able to get ahead of that because otherwise you have to sort of react to those problems and that's less effective and it's more expensive.”

The U of S website said funding was provided by the Western Grains Research Foundation, the Canada Foundation for Innovation, Saskatchewan Canola Development Commission, Saskatchewan Pulse Growers, the Saskatchewan Wheat Development Commission and the university.