A new multi-million dollar Phyto Organix Foods Inc. facility will be situated on 15 acres of land in the community of Strathmore. The company held a press conference on Tuesday that showcased the excitement in the town and region about the announcement.

Phyto Organix will be processing about 40,000 metric tonnes of yellow peas, grown in close proximity to the facility, into soluble and insoluble protein isolates, processed fibre and starch, and high-quality dietary pea hull fibre.

Speaking to Strathmore Mayor Pat Fule at the event he said the new facility shows that the municipality, their staff and developers are ready for new business ventures. “Strathmore is efficient and open for business,” he said.

He noted that the construction of the new facility will create 70 to 80 jobs in Strathmore and the Wheatland area.

The Mayor said that during the election campaign of 2021, “We had heard that people were really looking for a chance for jobs and employment so our strategic planning session talked about how we can move Strathmore into the future in agriculture and Phyto Organix came to s in December 2021. We worked really hard our staff, our CAO Kevin Scoble worked really hard and council was really supportive. We all worked together to try to make sure to do everything to bring this project to fruition,” he said.

In the future, the mayor noted that there will probably be discussions between the town and Phyto Organix about zoning, planning and engineering.

Presently there are a number of new construction projects starting up in the Strathmore region. “We are really excited because this Council and the previous one found ways to generate more revenue and to create more revenue streams to come into town,” said Fule. “The solar farm project is going to be fully operational by 2023. It's going to generate a lot of money in property taxes and lease payments it's going to create energy that will go through the grid through Fortis. We also have a new agreement with Wheatland County as far as cost-sharing and recreation, that's been a huge increase in our revenue and now with Phyto coming in there will be property taxes.”

More importantly, the new Phyto Organix facility will create jobs.

“Jobs in the construction of the place and jobs in the running of the place,” he said.

The Mayor noted that something that came out of the town’s strategic planning sessions was, “We wanted Strathmore to be a rural centre to move agriculture into the future, and so we think this is just an ideal concept for extraction of protein from yellow peas that Wheatland and Siksika farmers can grow and it's going to be amazing. It’s going to be good for the farmers, good for the residents in the Town and in the area.”

“One of the things I heard in the election campaign of 2021 was that people were looking for opportunities to live, work, and stay right in Strathmore and so we really have worked hard in our strategic planning and visioning as a council and this is one of the companies that we think is going to be a good tool for that to help that happen,” said Fule.

In terms of growing the local economy and attracting other similar businesses, the Mayor says

“We think that this would be maybe the first one and others will follow once they see that our planning department, CEO, staff or engineering or finance department, they're already willing and able to bring things into town for the economy.” He remarked that discussions with Phyto Organix only began in December and to get a project off the ground so quickly is a huge undertaking.

According to Phyto Organix, the Company will employ proprietary, integrated processing technology from SiccaDania A/S and has engaged Bird Construction and GHD Engineering to lead the design and construction of the facility and 3D connectivity to the processing equipment. SiccaDania is a Denmark-based, global leader in protein extraction technologies; Bird and GHD are proven leaders in building food and protein processing facilities in Canada. Phyto Organix’s 100,000 square foot facility will be the first net-zero plant protein processing facility in North America.