JULY 2017 GERMINATION.CA 11 PODCAST ALERT! Listen to interviews with Krista Erickson and Gail Livingstone at germination.ca/csaac- founders-trailblazers-right/ analyst members, 69 are female. “I knew all the founding members. They sure were quite a unique group of ladies. I don’t think they had any idea CSAAC would exist as long as it has. They did a good job,” Livingstone says. “Each of these ladies was a trailblazer in their own right.” Livingstone remembers founding member Ivah Clark very well. Clark served as CSAAC’s first president from 1944-1946. Lamphier, the woman sitting at the desk in that old photo, was probably the first female seed trader in Canada, Livingstone says. Then there was founding member Margaret Lothian, the first analyst to have her own private lab. It was called Seed Testing Services and it prospered for many years, Livingstone recalls. The other founding analysts were all employed by Toronto-based seed companies. Livingstone’s father owned a seed com- pany in Toronto called F.R. Smith Seeds. After working at the federal government seed lab in Toronto, Livingstone worked for her dad. Likewise, Erickson took after her mother, who was also an analyst, and actually worked with Livingstone on CSAAC-related issues all those years ago. Seed analysis can often be a family affair. “She always said I’d be a seed analyst. I said no at first, but here I am,” Erickson says with a laugh. Seed analysts are a tight-knit group, according to Livingstone. “It’s mainly led by women [in Canada]; not so much in the U.S., where it’s prob- ably 50/50 men and women. A lot of it has to do with salary expectations. Men maybe don’t feel they make enough doing it, especially if they have a family to sup- port,” she says. It can also be tedious work, Livingstone adds. “It takes a lot of patience. I sit here alone all day doing it. If you’re in a bigger lab, you have more people around you, but when you’re alone, it can get quiet.” That work drive has led to construc- tive changes within CSAAC over the years, driven both from within and outside the organization. “The Canadian government is depend- ing on us more and more to provide services to the industry as well as train our seed analysts. We added the execu- tive director position in 1995, which has helped CSAAC immensely in continuing 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1939 1940 1942 1943 1944 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 The Commercial Seed Analysts Association of Canada is formed. The soybean industry is born. Growth regulation ability of 2,4-D discovered; chemical is later widely used as a herbicide. The Second World War begins. to achieve our goals and progress as times change,” Erickson says. The first executive director was Connie Jacobs, followed by Doug Ashton, Frank Lewis, Betty Girard and Krista Greeniaus. “All of them have made significant advances in the history of our association,” Livingstone says. The most dramatic change for CSAAC was when the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) took over the accreditation of seed labs. “Prior to that, our membership would set the examination criteria, and they were tough exams; they would be marked by three people. When the government stepped in, it was a whole different ball game, though,” Livingstone says. Now, seed labs are tested twice a year by the CFIA, given proficiency samples that all labs must test and send back. “If you mess up on them, you can lose your accreditation. There’s a lot at stake now. It’s very rigid, which is probably a good thing, but it can be hard to wrap your head around if you remember the days when things were different.” As far as the association itself goes, its structure has changed over the years as new challenges have presented themselves. “We have all kinds of standing com- mittees now — one for research, one for membership, an ethics committee, et cetera. Over the years, whenever some- thing ugly reared its head, we would think, ‘We should have a committee for that,’ and one would be formed. They’re needed so we can keep up with all the changes and the seed regulations them- selves,” Livingstone says. Gail Livingstone is a former president of the Commercial Seed Analysts Association of Canada. Krista Erickson is executive director of the Commercial Seed Analysts Association of Canada.