Canada’s multi-billion-dollar bean business

Pulses, more commonly known as the humble bean or musical fruit, are chock full of protein, fibre, vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Canada is positively pulsating with pulses, ranking as the third-largest pulse producer in the world in 2024.

Canada’s pulse production in 2025 was mostly positive, with record high harvests of lentils and chickpeas.

Canada’s leading pulse crop in terms of weight was dry peas with 3.9 million tonnes produced in 2025, up 32.1% from a year earlier but well below the all-time peak of 4.8 million tonnes produced in 2016. Dry peas are mostly destined for animal feed with most grown in Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Lentils, loved by humans around the world, ranked second in terms of total pulse production in 2025 at a record high 3.4 million tonnes, up 38.3% from a year earlier, with most grown in Saskatchewan (2.9 million tonnes).

Chickpea production trended upward for the fourth consecutive year, rising by almost one-third (+31.3%) year over year to a record high 481 589 tonnes in 2025, with the bulk grown in Saskatchewan (91.8%).

Farmers received over $3 billion for their pulses in 2024, comparable with what the money farmers received for their corn for grain ($3.1 billion). Lentil farmers alone received more for their crop in 2024 than all fresh fruit farmers combined ($1.6 billion versus $1.3 billion).

That said, it was a down year for pulse farmers overall in 2024, with cash receipts down year over year for chickpeas (-41.6%), dry peas (-18.7%) and lentils (-10.0%).

One plus for the pulse was dry beans, where farmers received one-fifth (+20.0%) more for their crop year over year to a record high $407,317 in 2024.

Our food availability survey, which tracks the amount of food physically present in a country for consumption, shows that the amount of baked and canned beans available per person bounced back from a record low 0.87 kilograms per person in 2022 to 0.97 kilograms in 2023.

Nevertheless, baked and canned bean availability has been trending downward since 1965, when there were 3.0 kilograms available per person.

During our 2021 Census of Agriculture, 1,918 farms in eight provinces reported that the majority of their operating revenues came from dry peas and beans, with just over two-thirds of these farms located in Saskatchewan (1,305 farms). Alberta (347) and Ontario (105) ranked a distant second and third.

We will be taking the pulse of Canadian pulse farmers again this spring as part of our 2026 Census of Agriculture.