Paul McDonald the manager of terminal operations walks through the Alliance Grain Terminal at the Port of Vancouver. Around 4.7 million tonnes of grain pass through the gates of this facility every year.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
The success of grain’s odyssey from Prairie farm to hungry market in Asia can be decided by the minutes it takes to unload a railcar and load a ship.
Consider Alliance Grain Terminal at the Port of Vancouver. Every year, 4.7 million tonnes of grain pass through the gates of this 103-year-old facility – the oldest grain terminal at the port.
Surviving in this business is defined by a terminal’s “turns” – how many times a year the terminal is filled with grain, and then how many times that grain is emptied onto ships. At 47 turns a year, AGT is the champion of the Port of Vancouver.
“We can handle a lot,” AGT chief executive Tony Vigna said. “And that really comes down to logistics.”
Efficiencies are a necessity, because so much about the grain business is determined by forces outside the control of any single entity.
For example, grain cannot be loaded in the rain. The water ruins it. Every fleeting moment the skies of Vancouver are clear must be seized.
AGT chief executive Tony Vigna. AGT operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week and can unload up to 230 railcars a day. 'We can handle a lot,' Mr. Vigna says.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
But that is easier said than done. The grain “gut slot” – industry slang for busy season – is November through February, precisely when the Port of Vancouver faces upward of 160 millimetres of rain a month, precisely when the vast plains of Saskatchewan drop to an inhospitable -40 C and ice crystals cement on rail tracks, and precisely when the Rocky Mountains are most vulnerable to thunderous rain storms that swell river banks and subsume tracks.
Then there are challenges within the purview of the federal government: labour disputes, and Ottawa’s focus on expanding port infrastructure for containers, instead of bulk commodities.
A failure to address these concerns is also a failure to seize another precious moment, said Wade Sobkowich, executive director of the Western Grain Elevator Association.
Canada’s nearly unparalleled breadbasket produces 70 million tonnes a year in a myriad of crops, from canola to peas, barley and lentils. And the industry is well-versed when it comes to feeding the world: More than half of total food production in Canada is exported.
Ships sit in the loading area at the AGT. Rain delays and tight unloading windows can decide whether grain makes it to market on time.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
As the global population climbs alongside incomes in developing nations, demand for food could rise by 50 per cent by 2050.
The Canadian farmer is uniquely positioned to meet this demand, while expanding exports and diminishing Canada’s reliance on a few big markets.
But smaller markets demand lower prices and are often higher risk. Grain companies cannot compete if they must battle a system that is “high-cost” and “chronically disrupted,” Mr. Sobkowich said.
“Ottawa should be more keen than ever to understand the priorities of the grain sector.”
AGT operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week and can unload up to 230 railcars a day.
The site has two private berths – a golden ticket enjoyed by only one other grain terminal in the port. It means flexibility, Mr. Vigna said. The biggest challenge in a terminal is sequencing. Trains don’t always come carrying the right cargo for the ship in the berth. Two berths means you don’t have to take one out to put another in. Moving a ship costs a lot of money.
The terminal also has 200 storage bins that can hold anywhere from 40 to 700 tonnes each. That is significantly more than most modern terminals. Lots of smaller bins in a terminal goes back to a time of cheap land and cheap construction costs, and it is a big benefit today, Mr. Vigna said. It means different types of grain can be better organized and more efficiently loaded.
But that’s where Mr. Vigna’s jurisdiction ends.
“Grain can move up to 2,500 kilometres before it gets to a port position,” he said. “There’s a lot of challenges along the way.”
Grain storage facilities at the AGT.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
To get from the Prairies to the Port of Vancouver, the tracks must traverse the Rocky Mountains. All of the trains carrying grain, potash, coal and a host of other critical commodities from the centre of Canada to Vancouver must funnel through a single canyon and onto just two lines of rail.
In a dream world, the railways would blast the canyon and add 10 more tracks, Mr. Vigna said. But that’s practically impossible. “It’s going through a canyon, a rocky canyon.”
In 2021, an atmospheric river subsumed the Coquihalla Highway. The rail line was out for weeks. Extreme weather events are expected to become more frequent.
Those are just the complications that happen before the grain reaches the waterfront.
Rob Terpstra, a shipping agent who frequently works with AGT. 'I’ve never in my life – until I got into this industry – talked this much about weather,' he says.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
A port is an example of “chaos working in absolute rhythm,” said Robert Terpstra, a shipping agent at the Port of Vancouver. He describes a commercial vessel as a “living city” and is contracted by shipping companies to ensure the needs of this municipality are met. He organizes everything from immigration paperwork to doctor’s appointments and haircuts.
Some of the challenges are out of human hands, he said, including the climate in Vancouver and how grain reacts to water.
“I’ve never in my life – until I got into this industry – talked this much about weather.”
The ocean – and how it wraps around the Vancouver landscape – means there are two places where the inlet narrows and bridges can carry people and commodities from one side of Vancouver to the other. The North Shore – where a number of terminals for grain, coal, potash and lumber are located – is across the second narrows bridge. It is a single-track bridge, and it must be lifted to allow vessels to pass below. Every time the bridge lifts, trains cannot cross the second narrows.
And then there is labour.
The relationship between shippers and the union representing longshore workers has become increasingly fraught with more disputes in the past five years than the two decades preceding it.
Shelly Harvey the Director of West Coast Operations at Parrish & Heimbecker, which owns around half of AGT. P&H and competitors are testing fully automated systems to load grain in the rain, though most terminals remain in trial or planning stages.Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
According to a calculator from the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade, $8-billion of cargo was affected at B.C. ports during a 10-day lockout in November of 2024.
These costs carry forward, said Shelly Harvey, director of West Coast operations for Parrish and Heimbecker, one of the last remaining Canadian-owned grain companies. P&H owns around half of AGT, alongside Paterson Global Foods.
Global shipping companies will account for the risk of doing business in Vancouver by upping the rate they charge customers at this port.
According to an industrial inquiry report published in mid-2025, labour disputes at the port will remain a significant and costly problem as workers worry over automation and job security.
But automation is how AGT will become more efficient, Mr. Vigna said. It could help him tackle one of the terminal’s fundamental foes: rain.
In the past, a shipper could use tarps to cover the holes on the deck of the ship where grain poured into the hull. But safety concerns from the union removed this option.
Western Grain Elevator Association executive director, Wade Sobkowich, says Canadian grain will lose its competitive edge if it cannot get out to market fast 'at peak price periods... and at a lower cost than we do today.'Paige Taylor White/The Globe and Mail
P&H, alongside competitors, is experimenting with fully automated options that would allow the company to load grain in the rain but most terminals are still in the planning or trial stage. Implementing the new system will also require approval from the union.
It is a challenging feedback loop, Ms. Harvey said. Rainfall creates a problem that demands a solution, but it also limits the profits needed to fund a solution. Labour disputes only complicate and exacerbate. And somewhere in the mix lies mountains, atmospheric rivers and Prairie winters.
“Nothing can be looked at in isolation,” she said. “... The scope of it all has grown so much.”
The federal government has promised to invest in trade infrastructure as part of its bid to expand trade, specifically non-U.S. exports by 50 per cent within the decade.
The Contrecoeur Terminal Container Project at the Port of Montreal is on the major projects list, a federal list of projects that are in the national interest and will therefore be fast-tracked through regulatory hurdles. The project promises to expand the port’s container capacity by 60 per cent. An expansion at Roberts Bank Terminal 2 in the B.C. Lower Mainland also pledges to expand container capacity by 30 per cent.
However, very little grain or bulk commodities are shipped in containers.
The Major Projects Office is also also considering a multibillion-dollar expansion of Manitoba’s Port of Churchill.
The Port of Churchill is also not a viable option for the grain industry. The season for this northern port is too short to cover costs, Mr. Sobkowich said. An ocean freighter with a double hull capable of navigating an ice field is also expensive.
This feeds into broader frustrations held by those who trade one of Canada’s oldest commodities. The nearly unparalleled breadbasket of Western Canada gives the grain sector a right to feed the world, but Canadian grain will lose this competitive edge if it cannot get out to market fast or reliably, Mr. Sobkowich said.
“If we cannot move grain smoothy and efficiently, at peak price periods, within contracted windows, and at a lower cost than we do today, our competitors will.”