The City of Yorkton has a new economic development officer.
Samuel Twumasi assumed the position in November.
The transplanted Toronto-raised Twusami said he has been impressed with not just the community, but its people since his move west.
Twumasi said he had never expected to make the move. His then fiancé and now wife had taken a job with Crop Insurance in Melville with an eye to gaining a year’s experience and then heading back to Toronto.
“But she liked it here,” he said. “I couldn’t believe that. That was a real eye-opener.”
As is often the case the lady won out, and he followed her west.
Twumasi said his wife quickly told him Saskatchewan, and the Yorkton/Melville area was great in terms of raising a family, adding he would “get more time here with them than anywhere.”
In Toronto Twumasi faced a two-hour commute to work each morning, and two hours back at the end of the work day, not that he saw that as unusual.
“I was used to that,” he said.
Now, even living in Melville, his drive to and from Yorkton City Hall is significantly shorter.
The other point his wife made was that people here “are nice” he said.
It was one point he has already come to recognize as a true local strength.
“The people are nice,” he said, adding that is a great counterbalance to the winter weather which is more extreme than Ontario. “It’s cold but the people are nice, and it’s the people that really matter.”
On the economic side of things Twumasi, who had worked in the banking industry in Toronto, was aware of conditions here.
“I was aware of the atmosphere here,” he said, adding in the past the Canadian Prairies were not seen as a major economic region. “The last five years things have started to get positive, especially in Saskatchewan.”
Coming from Toronto, Twumasi said he feels he looks at the potential of Yorkton from a decidedly different vantage point.
“I look at the city in a very interesting light. I see opportunity here,” he said, noting with his different viewpoint he believes he “can add value” in his position.
To start with the time element here is different.
“I love it, the relationships you can develop,” he said. “You have time to actually build them.”
So what does Twumasi see as the key to local economic development moving forward?
“The key to making it happen for us is to focus on our strengths,” he said. He said it is very difficult to create whole new economies, so you have to work with existing foundations, and locally that remains agriculture.
“So what can Yorkton do to focus in on the strengths we do have? What kind of business compliment what is already established in Yorkton?”
The development of two canola crushing plants are a prime example of that strength, offered Twumasi.
“You can see the market is huge for both for those two huge companies to survive,” he said.
Twumasi said it’s his job to work to build on what the canola sector already does.
That is where the work the City is doing on the Integrated Commercial Transportation Project (ICTP) could be crucial.
Twumasi said whether you are talking farm level production, or local processing like the canola plants, product has to be transported to markets.
“We need to feed not just the rest of Canada, but the world,” he said. “… We have to transport what it is that they’re producing.”
Of course there are challenges in economic development at present, including a downturn in oil prices, a declining Canadian dollar, and the threat of rising interest rates.
Twumasi said it is an opportunity too, “to step back and refine our way of doing business …
“It’s not time for us to panic, but it is time to refocus.”
The current situation also changes how he does work in his new position. In recent years it has been a reactive position, dealing with businesses as they came knocking at the door. Now he said he must be more proactive.
“I have to chase the businesses opportunities you believe can be successful in our city … What will work within the economic structure Yorkton has already,” he said, adding he wants to target businesses which make sense for the city, because he wants them to be successful.
“I don’t want a business to come into Yorkton and fail … Their success is the City’s success,” said Twumasi.
So what one business would Twumasi most like to see start in Yorkton?
“That a really good question,” he said, then after a few moments reflection, he said a semi-truck service and sales centre. It would be a perfect fit with both the ICTP, as well as dovetailing with needs of those hauling canola, oats and other grains to the city, as well as the truck traffic passing through Yorkton on the highway system.
“A dealership would be perfect for here.”
