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Organic HeroesCelebrating the Organic Sector on the Prairies

Loiselle Family - October 13 2014 DSC7353

Honoured at Organic Connections 2014

The Loiselle family manages their intergenerational family farm which is located 50 kms northeast of Saskatoon, SK at Vonda, which is in what is known as the Trinity region. They grow cereal, oilseed, pulse, clover and hay crops; and raise chickens, goats and rare breed cattle.

They have worked with certified organic & biodynamic management practices since 1985. The farm has been in the Loiselle family for 108 years. They have had a lead role in the renaissance of Red Fife wheat, the same hard red spring wheat that their great grandparents first grew on their homesteads in south western Manitoba then here in Saskatchewan. Their family has given it new life and it is the mainstay of their farm.

Marc has been involved in numerous initiatives in the organic movement starting with chairing the certification committee for Saskatchewan’s first organic marketing cooperative in the mid 1980s. During that time he also responded to numerous requests from other farmers seeking alternatives to the pitfalls of chemical based agribusiness. He worked on the Canadian organic standards and had represented organics on the wheat-rye-triticale recommending committee for the variety registration system in Western Canada. He served as president, secretary, treasurer and on the certification review committee for OCIA SK#2 Chapter. The Loiselles are currently members of the OCIA Chapter #5. Marc is on the steering committee for Slow Food Saskatoon, Saskatchewan’s first Slow Food convivium. Marc & Anita are active within the provincial francophone community in promoting the concept and establishment of terroir, where organics is certainly an important element.

The Loiselles are long time National Farmers Union members; and in supporting the United Nations’ International Year of the Family Farm (2014) agree wholeheartedly with the NFU Women’s President Joan Brady “…that family farms should be the primary unit of food production. It is the commitment of those families to both their communities and their environments that are necessary to provide Canadians and the rest of the world with safe, nutritious food.”

The Loiselles have been outstanding advocates for organic farming and have spread the word in a number of publications and documentaries, including The Future of Food, Life Running Out of Control and The Fight for True Farming.

Marc was involved in the class action lawsuit against Monsanto and Bayer Crop Science for releasing genetically modified canola; where he served as communications and research director for the Organic Agriculture Protection Fund. This led him to be invited several times to travel to Europe to testify in court in France in 2003; and in 2002 to Germany, Austria and Switzerland with Anita to lobby against the dangers of genetic engineering in agriculture.

In 2007, Marc received the OCIA’s Research & Education Farmer of the Year award. Marc is of the fifth generation of the Loiselle family to farm their land. Marc & Anita have four children proud to be raised on an organic farm and striving to live as healthy as possible. Marc & Anita are now also happy grandparents too, and the family is ever growing. Despite their own successes and struggles, they are willing mentors for other farmers transitioning into organic farming. They truly embody their farm motto: Holistic Stewardship for Abundant Life.