City is makin’ bacon for the continent

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This article was published 18/07/2016 (3461 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Maple Leaf Foods’ bacon-processing plant in St. Boniface, which is already the largest in Canada, is getting even bigger thanks to a third major expansion within the last seven years.

The Mississauga, Ont.,-based food-processing giant is spending $24.1 million to expand the bacon-processing capacity at its Winnipeg plant, which produces all of its bacon and ham products for the Canadian and U.S. markets.

The same plant also underwent a $35-million expansion in 2009 and an $85-million upgrade and expansion in 2012.

The latest project, which is well underway and should be completed later this year, will create 68 new jobs — 34 full-time and 34 part-time positions. The plant currently employs about 1,400 people at its Marion Street and Lagimodiere Boulevard location.

The $24.1-million expenditure includes $5.9 million that has been invested in new processing and packaging equipment. The equipment upgrades, which were made with the help of $500,000 in federal and provincial funding, will enable the plant to boost its bacon production to 48 million kilograms per year from the current 40 million kilograms, said Rory McAlpine, the company’s senior vice-president for government and industry relations.

One of the new production lines uses robotics to stack and box bacon, McAlpine said.

“It’s quite unique — a first in Canada for this kind of production,” he said. “That’s the technology the governments were interested in promoting and we’re using the (financial) assistance to help pay for it.”

He noted the expansion also means Maple Leaf will no longer have to send some of the pork bellies that are produced at its hog slaughtering plant in Brandon to the United States to be processed into bacon.

“This is now going to happen here. So we’re repatriating that production out of the U.S. and bringing it back home and keeping the jobs in Manitoba.”

Although the Brandon plant already produces enough pork bellies to keep the Winnipeg plant running efficiently, McAlpine said Maple Leaf would love to see Manitoba hog farmers expand their production to allow for even more hogs to be slaughtered there.

“Right now that plant is running short of capacity, and we would welcome new investment in hog production and get the numbers back up to where they were when that plant was expanded.”

He said the Brandon plant currently processes from 65,000 to 75,000 hogs per week, and the company would like to boost that to at least 90,000 per week.

‘The two industries work closely together… so if one is expanding and (adding) new state-of-the-art equipment , it’s only better for the other’– Manitoba Pork Council chairman George Matheson

“The (hog production) industry is coming back from quite a challenging period but we’re looking forward to growth and investment in the next year or two,” he added.

Manitoba Pork Council chairman George Matheson, who attended Monday’s news conference, said hog prices and market conditions are improving, and the local industry would also like to see hog production expand over the next few years.

Matheson said another major expansion at Maple Leaf’s Winnipeg plant is encouraging news for local producers.

“We produce a lot of pigs in this province and we need a lot of processing capacity. The two industries work closely together… so if one is expanding and (adding) new state-of-the-art equipment , it’s only better for the other.”

murray.mcneill@freepress.mb.ca