One of Canada’s biggest ag co-operatives is moving ahead on plans to “optimize assets” by shedding its stake in grain handling in southwestern Ontario and focusing more closely on retail ag inputs.
Sollio Agriculture, the agribusiness arm of Quebec-based Sollio Cooperative Group, on Tuesday announced it will start “an orderly wind-down” of its Ontario Grain partnership, which operates six grain elevators in the region.
Those include the Shetland Road elevator at Florence, the Talbotville elevator at St. Thomas, the Becher elevator at Wallaceburg, the former Palmerston Grain elevator at Palmerston, and the elevators at Princeton and Staples.
Read Also
Senft to step down as CEO of Seeds Canada
Barry Senft, the founding CEO of the five-year-old Seeds Canada organization is stepping down as of January 2026.
Describing the decision as “difficult but necessary,” Sollio said the Ontario Grain business plans to continue serving its farmer clients during the 2022 harvest season, but at a “reduced capacity,” after which it will start an asset sale process with “prospective buyers.”
In the meantime, Sollio said, the business “intends to honour all existing contracts and to fulfill its obligations to farm customers, employees and business partners for an orderly transition.”
Sollio — then known as La coop federee — bought into the business in 2018, when it picked up Cargill’s Ontario grain and ag retail outlets as well as Cargill’s 50 per cent stake in grain handler/ag retailer South West Ag Partners. An Ontario holding company, Kent Holding Co., held the other half of the South West business.
Since then, however, Sollio — now the “majority shareholder” in the combined grain handling business — has found that “the financial challenges in the grain sector have made the continuation of Ontario Grain unsustainable.”
“The extraordinary events of the past two years causing global economic disruption led to unexpected, significant business challenges and a volatile commodity market,” Sollio Agriculture CEO Casper Kaastra said in a release Tuesday, adding that the decision follows “an exhaustive analysis of all available options.”
Sollio had telegraphed this move at its 100th annual general meeting back in February, when it announced it would be “entering a consolidation phase in which it will consolidate acquisitions and optimize assets.”
The co-operative said Tuesday it expects the Sollio Agriculture arm to come out of that consolidation process “focusing on the balance of its core business activity: providing innovative crop and livestock production products and services to farm producers across the country.”
“To continue that vitally important function for another 100 years, we must take actions to address the ever-changing challenges we face in the agriculture industry,” Kaastra said Tuesday.
Southwestern Ontario grain and oilseed growers who have questions or “require additional support through the transition” are asked to contact their local Ontario Grain representative, the co-op said. — Glacier FarmMedia Network
