Ask anyone who’s been forced to make dozens of jars of salsa when all the tomatoes in the garden ripened at once, and they’ll tell you that there’s a science to processing fresh food and getting it to consumers. That science is being studied at Alberta Agriculture, Food and Rural Development by Mechanical Engineering Technologist Ryan White.

Ryan doesn’t think of the sugar beets he is currently handling as food. These beets are an agricultural product that must be preserved after they are harvested (because beets that wilt or freeze or go moldy lose food value), and brought to a place where they can be processed into sugar. The value added to this product by processing is considerable: sugar is easier to store and use than beets.

But what are the most practical ways of storing sugar beets? Rogers Sugar Company wanted to know. The engineers at Alberta Agriculture have some theories, and Ryan conducts the necessary experiments and returns the data to them for analysis. He even collaborates on the design of some prototype-testing equipment. Many agricultural products are studied, and the information learned is crucial to private industry, from major corporations to family farms.