Agribusiness (Production Stream)

If you see yourself running a grain, cattle or mixed farm one day, the production stream of Lakeland’s Agribusiness diploma teaches you to manage it as a business. This two-year diploma is taught face to face at Lakeland’s Vermilion campus, home of the college’s agricultural sciences programmes.

The first semester is shared with the finance and marketing streams and includes Introduction to Agribusiness; once it ends you confirm production as your stream. From semester two, production stream courses apply business practices to crop, livestock and mixed farm operations, so budgeting, planning and selling decisions stay tied to what happens in the field and the barn. Lakeland also points this stream toward the ag retail side of the industry, such as animal nutrition, equipment sales and grain buying.

Production students benefit from Lakeland’s integration with the Student-Managed Farm, Powered by New Holland, where agribusiness learning meets a working campus farm. Simulations, case competitions and value-added agriculture projects add practice in judging whether a new farm enterprise will pay its way. In second year you choose between an agribusiness practicum and a business management and case analysis project. Because production overlaps with animal and crop science, you can add a second diploma in Animal Science Technology or Crop Technology in one extra year, or continue to Lakeland’s Bachelor of Agriculture Technology or a 2+2 degree at the University of Lethbridge or Olds College.

Graduates of the production stream become crop or livestock farmers and farm managers, or work as grain buyers, animal nutrition sales representatives, agricultural equipment salespeople and ag retail staff. The stream suits students from farming families planning to return home, and newcomers to agriculture who want to run or advise a farm with a clear head for costs and margins.