Since October, when Maple Leaf Foods announced plans to close its Saskatoon hog slaughtering plant, Saskatchewan's pork producers have been exploring the potential of becoming more directly involved in the processing industry.

Deputy Premier Clay Serby told delegates attending the Banff Pork Seminar, in a province that produces almost 2.5 million hogs per year the loss of processing capacity is unacceptable.

Clay Serby-Saskatchewan Deputy Premier
While slaughtering and processing is a low margin business it is an important part of the hog sector and it needs to be addressed.

We will continue to be a partner with the industry to attract development with new hog slaughter and processing plants in Saskatchewan.

Today our industry in our province plans to build a new slaughter plant and processing facility in Saskatoon and I can tell you that we will be working very closely with them.

We want to make sure that the new facility is built and operates in a way that is sustainable and that is long term and that has partners.

Saskatchewan, like other regions in Canada, have an ongoing strategy to develop our livestock and meat processing sector but recent changes and challenges have caused us to review our strategy and to ensure that it will grow the industry in a new environment.

Our strategy in Saskatchewan is to put an emphasis on growing Saskatchewan's feeding capacity on building our processing capacity to support the expanded production base.

We want to ensure that our production grows in step with our processing.

Serby says, despite the many challenges facing the pork industry today the provincial government firmly believes development of the Saskatchewan livestock sector is vital if it hopes to create jobs, a strong economy and a strong agricultural sector.

ThePigSite News Desk