YORKTON - It was certainly a day to remember in particular for the Louis Dreyfus Company, the city of Yorkton and for Saskatchewan pea producers as LDC officially marked the upcoming construction in the city with a sod turning recently.
Company officials and other dignitaries gathered on the site of LDC’s existing canola crushing plant to celebrate the start of construction of a new pea protein isolate production plant.
The new production plant is expected to be operational by the end of 2025 and will employ approximately 60 people once completed.
With the new plant LDC will bring significant economic benefits to the Yorkton community through the construction phase and beyond, similar to that already experienced since the company opened its existing canola crushing facility in 2009.
The canola plant was one of two – the other by Richardson Oilseeds – announced for the city on the same day – two separate announcements which collectively created what I would mark as likely the biggest news story for Yorkton in my near 35 years at the newspaper.
When the releases hit that day I admit the consensus in the newsroom was that one of the two companies would blink – withdrawing plans because they would not want to establish a plant right next door to a competitor. We were wrong.
Not only did both canola plants move forward, both have undergone significant plant growth since making Yorkton the destinations for huge amounts of Saskatchewan and Manitoba produced canola. That has been huge in terms of the local economy of the city, and perhaps even more significant for producers in terms of competitive market access.
And now LDC is adding pea processing to the Yorkton industrial complex.
The new plant is a pea protein isolate production plant, which basically means taking peas and creating a product that is destined for the food processing sector for things such as veggie burgers and a host of other products with more emerging all the time.
There is already a huge demand for veggie protein, and there is no reason to doubt that will continue, so the plant, a first for LDC makes a lot of sense.
Notably too is that if the plant is successful an expansion would seem a logical expectation give the company’s history in Yorkton in terms of its canola crush facility.
Certainly the pea processor is great news for the city and province in terms of economic stimulus, and locally builds on a significant agriculture value-added infrastructure base which includes TA Foods processing flax, Grain Millers with its oat processor, and the aforementioned canola crushing facilities.
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