CWB is adding a new elevator to its small but growing network of grain collection facilities in Western Canada.
The grain company announced March 24 that it is building a new “state-of-the-art” high throughput elevator at Bloom, Man., west of Portage La Prairie.
The new facility is expected to have storage capacity of 34,000 tonnes, a 130 car rail loop and loadout capacity of 60,000 bushels per hour.
Construction of the new facility will begin immediately with completion expected next year.
The first deliveries of grain are expected in time for the 2015 harvest.
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“Customer service was top-of-mind when choosing to invest in Bloom as the site for our first elevator”, said CWB president Ian White in a March 24 news release.
“As one of the highest efficiency elevators in Western Canada, farmers will be able to pull in and out of our elevator yard in record time.”
White said the site is accessible from a number of highways, including the Trans-Canada and the Yellowhead, and is located in an area with a clear need for more grain-handling capacity.”
The elevator is CWB’s first construction project, making good on earlier promises to acquire — through purchases, partnerships and new construction — a network of grain handling facilities across the West.
Other assets in the CWB network include Mission Terminal in Thunder Bay, Les Élévateurs des Trois-Rivières in Quebec and a minority interest in Prairie West Terminal.
CWB is required by legislation to submit a plan to privatize the company before Aug. 1, 2016.
Officials with the company said that they will build a network of collections facilities and offer equity to farmers who contract grain through the CWB.
For every tonne of grain contracted through the CWB in 2014, farmers will be offered $5 worth of equity in the privatized company.
White said grain delivered to the Bloom facility will be calculated in the farmer-equity plan.
“Every tonne of grain delivered to Bloom will be tracked for the purposes of CWB’s farmer ownership plan,” White said.
“We want farmers to have a stake in their value chain after privatization.” said White. “As we continue to grow, the benefits to farmers will grow with us.”
