HCPM26: "Wheat" Pete to serve as special guest speaker at Plowing Match

BY SCOTT STEPHENSON

As every good plowing match starts with a healthy wheat field, which makes Peter Johnson - better known to farmers across the nation as “Wheat Pete” - a more than fitting addition to this year’s Huron County Plowing Match (HCPM).

 

The Huron County Soil and Crop Improvement Association (HCSCIA) has invited the luminary agronomist to moderate its soil and crop demonstrations on the Friday afternoon of the match. HCSCIA members Alan Willits and Wim Feddes have selected Wheat Pete for his  outstanding ability to connect with farmers. “He’s a knowledgeable man, and he knows how to ask questions better than either one of us,” Feddes confessed. “That’s part of the reason why we’ve asked him.” 

 

Willits is sure that Wheat Pete’s infectious enthusiasm for agriculture will make this year’s soil and crop demonstration a highlight of the 2026 match. “Oh, he’s definitely a drawing card,” Willits told The Citizen. “He just has the ability to get the crowd very interested. He gets them revved up, and in an entertaining way!"

 

Although his nickname suggests otherwise, Wheat Pete’s passion for farming extends well beyond wheat. During his three decades with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food as Provincial Cereal Specialist, he became known for combining practical agronomy with a true flair for public speaking. Today, he continues to share that passion through his popular podcast, Wheat Pete’s Word.

 

From Wheat Pete’s perspective, everybody, not just farmers, should get into the habit of talking about the value of efficient agricultural practices. “Agriculture today produces almost four times as much food as we did in 1960 on only 10 per cent more land. We have taken the number of food insecure people in the world, from one in three back in 1920 to one in 10 in 2015,” he told The Citizen during a 2024 interview. “Now, one in 10 is still too many, but that productivity is one of the greatest success stories ever that mankind has ever achieved, and nobody even talks about it! It’s a huge, positive story that almost nobody knows. We take it for granted, so we don’t see the good that it brings. The availability of food allows people to move the bar on knowledge, which allows the human race to move forward. People can be doctors, people can be researchers, people can be astronauts -  and agriculture is the basis for all of that!”

 

The HCSCIA’s soil and crop demonstrations, featuring the one and only Wheat Pete, will begin at 2 p.m. on Aug. 21, at the 2026 HCPM in Morris-Turnberry.