The Rural Voice, 1998-01, Page 26Considering a Building Project?
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CLEANING SERVICES
Custom seed cleaning and treating of your own seed
Commercial seed brands available from
Zeneca, Cargill and Advantage
Take advantage now of the
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Custom grain cleaning for feed
Truck available for pick-up and delivery
Bags, totes and bulk available for both seed and feed orders
Dealer inquiries welcome!
Skid Steer service available, inquire on rates.
BRANT SEEDS
Cty. Rd. 10 N. of Hanover
Phone: 519-364-1525 Fax: 519-364-3835
22 THE RURAL VOICE
much complicated legal work to be
done. The co-op took possession of
the plant on October 8, making some
changes to the facility. Finally, the
producers held the ribbon cutting for
their new plant on November 14.
"Chicken producers will now be
able to use a processing facility
which they themselves own," Judge
said at the opening. "We are all
proud of the poultry we produce and
are pleased to have this opportunity
to bring our product one step closer
to consumers."
Though produced on chicken
farms just like all other
chickens, the product of the
, Farm Fresh Poultry Co-operative Inc.
plant will be different than most of
the chicken on the market. Most
chicken, after it has been killed,
plucked and cleaned, is chilled in a
cold water bath. In this process it
actually gains weight by absorbing
water. Poultry afficionados, however,
often grumble that flavour is lost in
the process.
Farm Fresh uses a more expensive
air -chilling process. This produces a
premium product that often sells at
higher prices. Though the bird
actually loses a little weight during
the air -chilling process, there's a
premium for the resulting product,
says Kressibucher.
To sell the product, the co-op has
retained some of the old staff and
boosted the sales staff.
The next scenario, Kressibucher
says, is to increase the allocation of
chicken to the plant. The 35
producers currently have quota for
two million kilograms of chicken in
every eight-week quota period. So
far, however, only 267,000 kilograms
has been allocated to the co-op,
meaning the vast majority of the
chickens produced by the partners
goes to other plants. There is no
quota for each processing plant, but
the processing companies, operating
under' the Association of Ontario
Chicken Processors, recommends to
the marketing board who gets how
much chicken from each quota
period.
There's a move, Kressibucher
says, to make this "assignment of
supply" process more formal, but
producers want to see the industry
remain more open to new entrants so
it will be competitive. Processors see
being able to trade this quota just as