by SUSAN MANN
The country’s largest food processing facility owned by H.J. Heinz Company of Canada LP and located in Leamington is closing leaving 46 contract tomato growers in southwestern Ontario without a market for their product.
“The industry has been carved in half,” says Walter Brown, director on the Ontario Processing Vegetable Growers board. He has been a contract grower for Heinz for 47 years and he took over the contract from his father. Brown grew 180 acres of tomatoes this year.
“This is devastating,” he says, noting they were hoping the plant would remain open even if it stopped taking raw tomatoes to make paste for ketchup. “All other Heinz plants buy paste from California to make their ketchup.”
Brown says he’s left without a choice and will have to grow more grains now that Heinz is closing. There isn’t another plant in Ontario that can take the amount of tomatoes Heinz’s growers were producing.
American entrepreneur Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway and 3G Capital, made up of Brazilian investors, bought Heinz this year.
Brown says they were told by a very reliable source Wednesday that the plant is closing. The company was to tell employees at a meeting this afternoon. The company was to issue a news release, he says and until “there is a news release that spells out exactly what they’re doing nothing is sure.”
In a typical year, Heinz contracts to buy about 230,000 tons of tomatoes but this growing season “was the worst growing year ever,” he notes. “As far as delivering the percentage of contracted tomatoes, it was the worst ever.”
The tomatoes are used to make ketchup and juice.
The announcement of the closure isn’t totally unexpected, Brown says. The Leamington plant was the only one of Heinz’s facilities in the world that converted raw tomatoes into paste and that “kept us thinking when would the shoe drop.” Heinz has closed other facilities around the world that used raw tomatoes to make paste.
The Leamington plant is the second largest Heinz plant in the world and has been operating for 104 years. It employs 750 unionized workers, 150 salaried staff and 340 to 360 seasonal staff. It mainly supplies the Canadian market but also ships some products to the United States.
From 2008 to 2012, an average of 13,377 acres of tomatoes were grown for processing with an average farm gate value of $54.5 million.
Brown says growers in Essex and Kent produce more than 500,000 tons of tomatoes for processing annually and Heinz has taken almost half of the production. “When you’re cutting the production almost in half, it’s gigantic. It guts the industry big time.”
Joan Patterson, Heinz corporate affairs leader, couldn’t be reached for comment. BF
Comments
This is just one more nail in the coffin by the Liberals with their poor policy's and lack of respect for rural Ontario and more so Agriculture . Wynne just last month announced that she wanted to see agriculture double it's growth and add 120,000 new jobs . Then we have Peters talking of 60,000 new jobs . We can't even keep the ones we have already but these people dream up new ones . Then we have farm leaders praising them while we watch our jobs leave the province . Processing has been leaving Ontario for years now but no one in Gov wants to even acknowledge it because it is not the auto sector .
When you have the most expensive and ever increasing energy prices in North America you can bet you ass that these companies will pack up and go else where .
The Liberals want to turn Ontario into a residential only province where health care , nursing homes and Gov. are the only employers .
It's hard to point a finger at the root cause of this one. Heinz set up in Leamington because the global economies of scale in 1909 made it profitable to do so. That's no longer the case. If anything, blame the Bank of Canada's policy of supporting a strong Loonie. An 85 cent dollar would assure continued production in Leamington. This is a national issue, not a provincial issue.
If you can't do it at a par dollar then why should you wish for a false economy 85 cent dollar when in reality you could be at a 1.20 dollar . Way too many false economy hog barns were built , complained about but never sat empty . You can't say the same about factories in the cities though .
They are doing no such thing, if anything, the BofC is jawboning the dollar down. All western economies are trying to devalue their currency through central bank and government interference to give their economy the edge. The BofC has been purchasing mortgage backed securities, while the US has done the same but has also purchased its own treasuries. You are correct that an 85 cent dollar would help. The primary reason our dollar was higher was because of the financial crash of 08-09. With everything being normal(if we can call it that) our dollar should always be lower than the american. Raube beuerman
A low Canadian dollar mainly only helps with exports . Does nothing but increase costs for import goods . With our failed economy of today we need not worry about being any where other than par until we can secure jobs and companies here first other wise it will be a short lived party .
I would have to say you are speaking as a true export minded me first and only me citizen . We need to value add here to secure jobs not ship raw products .
A low dollar may make me a little more money for my small farm, but I import plenty of parts from the US for my business, so a high dollar is better from that respect. In addition, most of the parts that I do source from all of my Canadian suppliers, aside from some manufactured in Quebec, come from all over the world. Raube Beuerman
The "me first and only me" state of mind applies to protectionists, especially dairy and poultry farmers, to a far-greater extent than it could ever apply to people who see exports as an opportunity to enhance jobs and opportunity.
Furthermore, there's absolutely nothing wrong with exporting raw products if that makes us better off than exporting nothing.
Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON
Del Monte label was sold a few years ago. The fruit cups are profitable.
St. Davids plant shut down.
Now we had Del Monte brand on store shelves filled with Chinese fruit. Read the print on the label.
Truth is, very few read the origin of food. They only see the sticker price.
There are less high paying, full-time jobs today so more people will pay attention to the sticker price.
Too bad tomatoes are not supply managed.
Wasn,t it Warren Buffet who commented a couple of years ago who said the billionaires should give most of their fortune away when they leave to that billionaire ranch in the sky. He didn,t tell anyone that he is still pounding people into the ground b buying companies and putting thousands of people out of work so he can still add to his fortune. Like the Liberals really care about the people of Ontario or Canada, as long as they get their big pay with the golden pension they could care less. BIG CORPERAIONS AND GOVERMENT = BIG GREED. Isn,t it time we make those groups of people help the Canadians out instead of stealing every penny ( sorry Nickel ) out of our pocket.
Consumers want Walmart pricing , Business wants to be where its the cheapest and farmers the ultimate price shoppers buy Chinese glyphosphate-products ,ect Since its a world market everything eventually flows too the lowest COP area. I feel bad for workers,growers and multi suppliers for Heinz . Like Mayor Paterson said "they have been good corporate citizens" . Fact is Ontario has expensive infrastructure ,social programs and bankrupt Provincial Gov't ...we lost tobacco quota guys years ago , so I would not expect SM or ethanaol either too be immune from market forces kg kimball
quote: "When you have the most expensive and ever increasing energy prices in North America you can bet you ass that these companies will pack up and go else where ." Now add in 6000 almost constructed wind turbines with associated gas backup plants to actually increase CO2 emissions and see what happens. Where is the overall Business Plan on Greed energy as the auditor general, other economists, the engineers association and the power workers association have suggested??????? Everyone knows the captain of the titanic claimed he was right but all know how that turned out. I expect the Liberals come hell or high water are going to go down with the ship saying we still deny the iceberg was there. Furthermore, we are now going into full conservation mode so we can use less energy and divide the super expensive green energy grid upgrades over less kwhrs. Bone headed plan in my opinion. To add insult to injury we are also proposing to cut base load power which will most likely result in grid brown out. All with little to no CO2 decrease.
You should see what the Liberals have for Ontario on the drawing board for more wind turbines at high prices being paid for kwh.
6,700 Large Onshore Wind Turbines in Ontario
To see the most recent list of turbines installed in or proposed for Ontario (Canada), click this link:
Ontario turbines installed or proposed by Nov 8
All are as big or larger than Toronto’s Ex Place turbine.
Ontario wind turbines by county
Local workers from Hainz and tomato growers should look into exporting tomato products to Asia. We have excellent chilies growing in Limington which could be used for Asian stile of tomato based chile souces.
Yet again it was reported last night on the news that yet another company is leaving Ontario and moving back to the USA . Wouldn't be the cheap hydro rates and the cheap hydro that Ontario sells them on the backs of the Ontario residents now would it ?
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