Saskatchewan’s food industry to benefit from new development centre
Food in Canada
Processing Research & Development Bake & Snack Food Beverages Confectionery Dairy Fruit & Vegetables Ingredients & Additives Meat &Poultry Pet Food Specialty Foods food product developmentThanks to a $13-million investment, Saskatchewan’s Food Industry Development Centre is being rebuilt and updated, helping the province’s food industry grow its value-added sector
Saskatoon, Sask. – Food processors in Saskatchewan, and especially new food entrepreneurs, will benefit from a new and updated food development centre.
The province and the federal government are investing more than $13 million for the Saskatchewan Food Industry Development Centre Inc. to build and equip a new innovative facility.
In Saskatchewan, the food centre is the primary source of food product development, technology transfer and commercialization for the province’s food industry.
The new 30,000-sq.-ft. facility will support the expansion of Saskatchewan’s food ingredient processing sector, and will have product development, specialized laboratory services, extrusion technology and interim processing capacity.
“Saskatchewan’s agriculture sector will achieve long-term benefits directly from this investment by increasing our ability to expand global market opportunities in value-added processing,” says Dan Prefontaine, the president of the Saskatchewan Food Industry Development Centre.
“The food centre’s new agri-food innovation centre will support innovation and technology through enhanced expertise, training and commercialization resources to assist our industry in accessing markets with new products and services.”
Construction is scheduled to begin this spring and is expected to be complete by 2017. The total cost of the project is expected to be just under $16 million. Nine million of the funding will be provided under Growing Forward 2 and $4.3 million will come from Western Economic Diversification Canada. The remaining funds, approximately $2.5 million will come from industry investment into the food centre and from the food centre’s capital replacement fund.
The food centre has worked with more than 245 clients and has developed more than 600 food products since it was established in 1997.
Some of the innovative products developed at the food centre include fruit infused honey, flavoured camelina oils, beef jerky, bison Saskatoon berry jerky, granola bars, breakfast cereals and barley snacks.
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