Pulse Specialist Says More Farmers Considering Growing Peas

The province's pulse specialist says there seems to be a revived interest in growing peas, thanks in part to Roquette's pea processing facility being built near Portage la Prairie.

Dennis Lange was a presenter last week at Manitoba Ag Days.

"The last two years we've been drier and pea yields have been quite good," he said. "Growers like to have different options for cropping, peas have a nice fit for that. You're planting early, you're harvesting early, there's been more demand now for some of these different markets that we're moving into now."

Lange says there was about 80,000 acres of peas grown in Manitoba in 2018.

"With protein demand, there seems to be more and more interest in growing peas again," he added. "We're seeing soybeans start to drop off, so growers are looking for different options as well to kind of spread the risk around a little bit too."

Lange expects soybean acres to drop from about 1.9 million acres in 2018 down to roughly 1.5 million in 2019.