There are probably more than 1,000 Web sites serving agribusinesses in Alberta, says the manager of Alberta Agriculture’s site.
The number of Web sites underscores the farm, ranch and agricultural service presence on the Net, says Gerard Vaillancourt.
There are even more e-mail addresses from farms and farm business out there, but he isn’t collecting them.
“Rural Alberta and the agricultural community are connected as much as anyone,” he says.
About 55 per cent of the province’s 59,000 farms and ranches are on the Internet. “They aren’t located as close to resources as people in cities,” says Vaillancourt. “This puts them on an even field.”
It’s a Net gain for the department, too. “The Internet has become an extra way to provide information to Alberta farmers and ranchers, and it can work 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” he says.
Statistics Canada data show that 21.2 per cent of Canadian farms and ranches had a computer used for farm management in 1996. That was up from 11 per cent in 1991 and 2.7 per cent in 1986.
Alberta had the second-highest rate of use at 22.9 per cent; B.C. led with 23.6 per cent.
Forty-five per cent of all households in Canada had computers in 1998, compared to 23 per cent in 1993.
