New life for pork plant
July 29, 2008
Winnipeg Free Press
Written by: Larry Kusch
*Shindico was the broker of record in the facility purchase below*
A Manitoba company announced today it plans to convert the former Maple Leaf pork processing plant at 663 Marion St. into a beef processing facility.
Natural Prairie Beef, owned largely by Manitoba beef producers, will initially use the plant to process cuts of premium-brand naturally raised (hormone-free) beef.
It plans eventually to turn the plant into a modern, mid-sized, federally inspected beef slaughtering and processing facility capable of marketing Manitoba beef anywhere in the world, according to the Manitoba Cattle Enhancement Council, a partner in the plant.
The MCEC administers an investment pool that is funded by a levy on all cattle sold in the province.
The council said in a press release this morning that it has doubled its stake in Natural Prairie Beef to $2.4 million. Last fall, it invested $1.2 million to help kick-start the project.
However, the location of the proposed plant had not been announced until today.
The enhancement council said its investment helped Natural Prairie buy the St. Boniface facility. A sale price was not immediately disclosed.
After an initial set of plant upgrades are completed this fall, the company expects to begin marketing cuts of beef to Manitoba retailers and (directly to) consumers late in the year. It will employ only 15 to 20 people at that time.
The company expects the plant will employ 80 people by 2010, once it completes renovations and ramps up production.
Plans call for the completed plant to have the capacity to process 250 head of cattle per week, although that volume could easily be doubled through further upgrades, the MCEC said in its release.
“We’re very pleased to have MCEC add to their initial investment as we take this operation to the next level,” said Kelly Penner, president and CEO of Natural Prairie Beef.
“Our business plan calls for a conservative, phased-in approach. At the end of the day, we’re confident that we’ll be able to build a successful global brand for premium Manitoba beef.”
Bill Uruski, the former provincial NDP cabinet minister who chairs the cattle enhancement council, said Manitoba producers were “all but shut out” by Alberta and Ontario beef slaughter plants when the U.S. closed its borders to Canadian beef during the 2003 BSE crisis.
“They had no place to take their animals and it nearly ruined our beef industry,” he said in a statement.
That prompted the province to establish the MCEC to invest in new beef slaughter and processing capacity.
With a new Manitoba plant in the works, Uruski said, “we’re very close to being able to say, ‘Never again.’”
larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca
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