Imagine a place where people – young and old, rural and urban – come to learn about agriculture and food. Whether on a school trip or a family outing, people walk through both permanent and rotating exhibits which give them a fun and interactive experience to learn how food, fibre and fuel is grown and processed. It is also a conference centre for the community, a training centre for farm employees or university students to take a short course, and a hub for agricultural tours to real, working farms.
Now imagine this place is here in the heart of rural Ontario, just down the road in Listowel.
A growing group of community members and supporters have caught the vision for an Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre in the last few years. At the end of March, the Board of Directors hosted an Annual General Meeting at Trillium Mutual Insurance’s community space in Listowel. For an organization that started during the heart of a global pandemic, it was the first public meeting they had in-person. Several people also joined online, including Senator Rob Black joining from Ottawa. Municipal council members, a representative from Minister Lisa Thompson’s office and founding members joined the event in person.
Steve Dolson, an Atwood-area dairy farmer and former chair of Gay-Lea co-operative, now leads the Board and his report gave attendees a solid understanding of how the vision evolved to what it is today.
The group began formally as the Huron Perth Agricultural Science Centre, but originally it was a loose group of community members that wanted to see a children’s museum or some sort of tourist destination in Listowel. Considering the rural area, the concept quickly evolved to a centre that would highlight excellence and innovation in agriculture, a Science Centre.
Through Ontario Trillium Fund support, North Perth Council contracted Lord Cultural Resources to undertake a feasibility study in 2020. The Huron Perth Agricultural Science Centre was officially registered as a non-profit in 2021 and gained charitable status in 2022. In 2023, Process Curiosity was contracted to review the original study and develop a work plan. This report concluded that the project would do well to expand its scope to the rest of the province and to the rest of the agri-food industry. In 2024, the Board officially rebranded the project to be the Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre.
The Municipality of North Perth has been a large supporter of the vision. They have committed to provide 10 acres of serviced Municipal property on the edge of Listowel, next to the Steve Kerr Memorial Arena, and they have supported the salary of a part-time administrator since 2024, when they hired Jessica Deitner. The volunteer Board agrees that she has helped their efforts tremendously.
The goal is for a 35,000-square-foot space, with 18 staff to run the centre. Conservative estimates of the costs are $20 million, though the final number could eventually be nearly double that. The first phase involves modelling the building, experience planning and hiring a professional fundraiser; it is estimated the group will require $550,000 to get this phase started. So far this year, they have already raised $100,000 and support is growing.
The Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre’s Board of Directors at the March 27 Annual Meeting. Back row (L-R) Jessica Deitner, administrator, Marline Stoltz, Dawne Boersen,Barry Crean, Steve Dolson, Dave Bray, Claudia Prescott. Front row (L-R): Jillian Lewis, Sylvia Behrns, Christine Schoonderwoerd, Cassie Greidanus. (Missing: Elizabeth Johnston)
The group listed their sponsors to date (and in alphabetical order): Boulevard North, Corteva Agriscience, DesignLogix Engineering Inc., Grand River Agricultural Society, Hensall Co-op, Huron Perth Agriculture and Water Festival, Molesworth Farm Supply Ltd., Ontario Trillium Foundation, OPPA Branch 6, Perth County Cultivating Opportunity Grant, Schoonderwoerd Bros. Concrete Ltd., The Municipality of North Perth, Trillium Mutual Insurance, Ward & Uptigrove and Wallenstein Feed & Supply Ltd.
The non-profit also offer $100 memberships for individual community members, and $250 for business members, which helps to support their core operating expenses, and all donations and memberships qualify for a charitable tax receipt.
The Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre has taken inspiration from Fair Oaks Farms in Indiana and the Farm Wisconsin Discover Center, both of which provide tours, interactive displays and attract hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Fair Oaks Farms is a 36,000- cow dairy, but their off-farm tourist centre includes a restaurant and a hotel. A representative spoke at the group’s annual meeting two years ago.
And this year, they heard from another collaborator, the Agriculture and Food Museum in Ottawa, whose director, Kerry-Leigh Burchill, spoke at the March event.
One of three national museums in Ottawa, the Agriculture and Food Museum is also a “working” farm with 200 various animals and 200,000 people visiting annually. It is located on a national historic site, the Central Experimental Farm property and was opened as a museum in 1983. It hosts over 42,000 school program children, hosts a summer camp for 1200 children annually, has a mobile museum that goes out to events, trains teachers and offers a host of programming and exhibits.
From Kerry-Leigh’s perspective in Ottawa, she also sees that farmers can be vilified in the media as the cause of high food prices or of climate change. “Questions from the public are becoming more complex as they have more information, and oftentimes misinformation,” she says. It is imperative to remind people that they depend on food, farmers and the agri-food industry.
“So how can we all raise awareness and appreciation,” asks Kerry-Leigh. She says the Museum is happy to collaborate with the Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre; they collaborate with the various provincial and national farm groups as well. “Agriculture is too vast a topic for any one organization to do alone,” she says, so collaboration is key. She extended and open invitation to all to visit the Museum in Ottawa.
The Ontario Agri-Food Discovery Centre is building relationships with the University of Guelph, Farm & Food Care and Agscape to collaborate and mutually support each other’s goals for agri-food education.
Steve Dolson has put a lot of his energy into the organization over the last years on the board. He found out about the organization in 2021 when they put a call for board members in the Listowel Banner. With decades of experience in board leadership, he was eager to take on a new project and he is passionate about raising the profile of agriculture and food industry.
“The general public don’t have their minds wrapped around how important ag is and that one in nine jobs in Canada are associated with our sector,” says Steve. “We often talk about farm to fork, but so much is done before the farm that will be important to highlight as well.”
Jillian Lewis was one of the founding board members with the original vision back in 2019 and she says she is thrilled to see the community support and how far they have come so far. “We've got such an amazing group of people who are dedicated to seeing this vision come to life,” she says, mentioning the support of the municipality, organizations and local businesses as well as individual community members. “Everybody is just fantastic.”
She admits that the pandemic was a tough time to start an organization. “We got burned out. Everybody was dealing with what was happening in the community, and it kind of went on the back burner,” she says, but now the initiative is becoming more of a priority for people.
Marlin Stoltz, co-founder of what is now Equipment Ontario and several dealerships across the Rural Voice area, is one of the newest board members to take up the torch. He is passionate about the project, not only for education opportunities for non-farmers, but he would also like to see the space used for agricultural training and courses closer to home, partnering with universities and trade schools to keep training in our backyard.
“The University of Guelph used to be the center of agriculture in the province, but it has shifted,” Marlin explains. Just looking at a map, North Perth is smack dab in the centre of an intensively-farmed area, with various livestock, feed and grain commodities.
North Perth Mayor, Todd Kasenberg, was also in attendance at the March event. He spoke positively about the area’s leadership in the agriculture sector and sees the opportunities for the municipality to support and celebrate agriculture with such an important attraction. Council knew they needed a draw for the town of Listowel and when community members approached them with the idea, the light bulbs went on, he said.
“It gives us a clear opportunity to celebrate what we are at heart in our agricultural community,” says Mayor Kasenberg. “Council has been supportive, we're excited about being able to provide some land, we've given some money to support the group’s administrative purposes, and we’ll continue to look at how we can help.”
Of course, it is a big price tag. The community plans on asking the provincial government and accessing cultural grants, but to get these funds, they will need to demonstrate local community support. “It’s going to take a community to bring this forward, I can’t stress that enough,” says Steve Dolson. If Rural Voice readers would like to learn more and support the project, please visit www.oafdc.ca.◊