Ontario hay generates more wealth than soybeans in Ontario but most people don’t seem to realize it.

Corn is king in Ontario but forages are the second most important crop in terms of economic impact. Based on hay and pasture production for 2007, a Kemptville campus of the University of Guelph research study conducted by Jim Fisher found that the forage industry was about two-thirds the size of the corn industry in terms of cash value. But hay is also about 33 per cent larger than the soybean industry. The forage industry’s economic impact was $648 million, the study found.

"This didn’t surprise us," said Joan McKinlay, communication officer for the Ontario Forage Council. "But this will surprise a lot of people. Corn and soybeans are traded on the markets so we see the large volumes."

On the other hand, a lot more hay is grown by a farmer for his own farm and "the cash value doesn’t show up anywhere," she said.

Thanks to this new research, it should put an end to forages being the poor cousin when it comes to funding for research projects, McKinlay argued. Forage research only gets about 10 per cent of forage research dollars from the provincial government, she said. "Now we have some numbers to say we really are a major part of agriculture."

While Ontario planted about 1.9 million acres of corn and about 1.65 million acres of soybeans last year, there are about 2.5 million acres of hay and another 1.8 million acres of pasture.