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Hanfood and Cumberland College to co-operate with research, training

A partnership between Hanfood and Cumberland College will allow the two to work together to research ways to improve their food products and train workers with the skills the company needs.
Hanfood Sign
Submitted Photo/Hanfood

A partnership between Hanfood and Cumberland College will allow the two to work together to research ways to improve their food products and train workers with the skills the company needs.

Hanfood aims to export high quality food grown in Saskatchewan to China and the Pacific Rim. It’s currently involved in the honey export business and is planning to build a high output grain terminal in Nipawin.

“What the [agreement] does is it establishes a framework – a relationship, if you will – for us to move forward in the near future and start talking about doing specific applied research partnerships to address specific issues,” saidTom Weegar, the college’s president.

“This is a good [example] of industry and education working together,” said Chris Hudyma, Hanfood Grain Hub’s chief operating officer. “We both have a role to play. We want to put out the best product and have a skilled, trained workforce and, in my opinion, Cumberland College is a perfect match for us.”

Hudyma said he and Weegar have been talking to each other for years about a partnership.

“We both have a strong belief in education and training and we just started talking from their end and looking at how we could work together on something like this,” he said.

Weegar said he had even had a memorandum of understanding prepared back in 2016 for a potential partnership.

“Just in the last couple of weeks, they approached us and said, ‘Tom, what about putting together an MOU?’ and I thought, ‘brilliant. Let’s do it.’”

So Weegar dug up the memorandum, made a few changes and the two organizations signed it. That said, more discussion will be needed to hammer out the details of how the two will co-operate.

Right now, what interests Hanfood the most is honey production. The company wants to see the volume of the sweet substance increased. By working with the college, applied research could be done to find ways to increase production capacity, as well as finding ways to speed up filtering and processing without accidently converting it into a sugar. Applied research could also find new value-added products that could be processed here and then exported.

“The applied research piece is the piece that really excites me because we have the potential to work with them to address problems or issues of concern that relate to their industry,” Weegar said.

The college is able to access federal funding from the Sciences and Humanities Council to help fund this applied research.

Hanfood’s also interested in packaging and promotion. It wants to see its products to be healthy and traceable by its Chinese consumers through an app, which is something the college might be able to help with. Hanfood’s also interested in the college bringing in a beekeeper training program. Once the terminal is built, the company expects it will need training for the employees working there.

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