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Exposing students to skills and thought processes through the Faculty of Agriculture’s Cultiv8 program builds the foundation required to be successful in the ever changing agri-food industry.

This program is receiving a $250,000 gift from TD over the next ten years inspiring students to engage in skills development for the 21st century agricultural workforce. TD is committed to helping individuals prepare for the jobs of tomorrow in communities across North America. That’s why TD continues to invest in training, entrepreneurship, small business and other initiatives.

"Through The Ready Commitment, TD is proud to support initiatives like Cultiv8 that prepare people for the jobs of tomorrow," says Jennifer Auld, Vice President, TD Canada Trust – Atlantic Region. "Equipping students with employable skills positions them to succeed in their careers and ultimately address issues we face today and in the future. We are excited to be a part of this program and contribute to a more sustainable tomorrow."

The annual gift of $25,000 will support the Cultiv8 sandbox,  which offers students skill- building in areas crucial to being innovative. This is achieved through experiential programming that focuses on communication, collaboration, creativity and problem-solving.

“Today’s students are challenged with bigger issues than ever before and they are forced to sift through huge amounts of information to make informed choices,” says Jason Grant, Manager of Cultiv8 Agricultural Sandbox. “We need to arm them with tools to make them agile in the 21st century workforce; to make them capable of innovating toward food systems sustainability.  Cultiv8 students build those tools by participating in collaborative, experiential programming and that programming bolsters their academic pursuits and translates to any career choice. The gift from TD enables valuable opportunities like these to continue being offered at Cultiv8.” 

Patrick Hennessy, an alumnus and Cultiv8 student, understands the value of entrepreneurship and innovation to students and to the agricultural industry.

“As the world population grows, food security is becoming a growing issue. Innovation will help ensure that we can produce enough food for the entire population," he said.  "In Nova Scotia, innovation in agriculture allows our farmers to compete on a global scale. Innovation allows our farmers to produce more food for their money, which keeps their selling prices low enough to compete with food from other markets.”

Hennessy is undertaking research on the Agricultural Campus using Deep Learning (a form of Artificial Intelligence) to detect weeds such as fescue and sheep sorrel in wild blueberry fields. Deep learning works by showing a computer thousands of labelled pictures of an object. Through this process, the computer “learns” the visual features of the object and can identify it again in unlabelled pictures.

“I plan to implement this technology on a commercial herbicide sprayer for spot-application purposes. Currently, commercial sprayers apply a uniform coating of herbicide across an entire field,” Hennessy explained.  “In most fields, the weeds only cover patches of the field and not the entire area. By using deep learning to recognize weeds, the sprayer nozzles can be turned on when a weed is detected and turned off otherwise. This will result in less herbicide usage overall.”

Hennessy credits skills developed through Cultiv8 as valuable to his research.

“I think that communication and interviewing skills were the biggest takeaway from Cultiv8 for me. It’s given me the skills to dig deeper into conversations and helped me better understand the problems of the people my research is going to help.”

About TD  Global Corporate Citizenship

TD has a long-standing commitment to enriching the lives of its customers, colleagues and communities. As part of its corporate citizenship platform, The Ready Commitment, TD is targeting CDN $1 billion (US $775 million) in total by 2030 towards community giving in four areas critical to opening doors for a more inclusive and sustainable tomorrow – Financial Security, Vibrant Planet, Connected Communities and Better Health. Through The Ready Commitment, TD aspires to link its business, philanthropy and human capital to help people feel more confident - not just about their finances, but also in their ability to achieve their personal goals in a changing world. For further information, visit www.td.com/thereadycommitment.

About Cultiv8

Cultiv8 is a collaborative collision space where students create changes in knowledge, skills and attitudes. Students who engage in Cultiv8 will learn to communicate, problem-solve, and prototype. In our supportive environment, we build confidence in testing ideas through creativity, exploration, and collaboration, so that our students can become more competitive in the 21st- century workforce. At Cultiv8 we believe that the next generation of Nova Scotia students will change this province into a collaboration hub.