AGRIS Co-Operative Completes $5 Million Overhaul to its Fertilizer Facilities

COTTAM, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Sept. 30, 2015) - AGRIS Co-operative owners are proud to announce the official opening of their new fertilizer storage and blending facility in Cottam, a capital investment of more than $2.6 million. This new investment is the largest element of an overall strategy to increase capacity throughout the co-operative's full trade territory.

The new facilities in Cottam will increase the previous blending capability to 200 MT per hour, eight times faster than before and the storage capacity to 4500 MT, nine times the previous capacity. An additional $1.2 million has been spent in fertilizer storage and blending capacities at the AGRIS Dutton location, which was officially opened Sept. 28, 2015. The Dutton facility has increased their blending capacity to 200 MT/hour and the storage capacity has been increased three-fold.

"This is about investing in our future by increasing our capacity to meet our farmer-owners ever increasing requirement for speed, accuracy and flexibility," said AGRIS Co-operative board president, Larry Pajot. "In 2014 the board set a $5 million plan in motion. With analysis and support from GROWMARK we have fundamentally changed our fertilizer blending capacity across AGRIS and are now better able to meet the present and future needs of our owners and customers," added Pajot.

Special guest speaker at the ribbon cutting ceremony was Jim Spradlin, chief executive officer of GROWMARK Inc. "These facilities represent the highest level of co-operation within the GROWMARK System. Partnering with AGRIS Co-operative to establish these new facilities allows us to leverage resources to best address member and customer needs for a reliable supply of products that help produce food," says Spradlin.

"After the spring of 2013 it was clear that we needed to be able to service more acres per day to ensure our owners and customers could plant their crop during a challenging spring. As farmers continue to adapt their stewardship practices, the need for flexibility and timeliness are amplified," says AGRIS Co-operative general manager Jim Campbell. "We are now using the latest technology to seamlessly transfer information from the field to the plant and back to the field using our Advanced Information Systems. We are working hard to leverage new technology to maximize yields and profitability at the farm-gate across our whole co-operative system," added Campbell.

AGRIS Co-operative Ltd. is a 100 per-cent farmer-owned grain marketing and farm-input supply company that serves more than 1,000 farmer owners in 14 locations in Essex, Kent, Elgin, Middlesex and Lambton Counties. It is a leader in precision farming technology, seed, agronomy and petroleum services. The co-operative is a partner of Great Lakes Grain, a grain merchandising company. AGRIS Co-operative is a member-owner of GROWMARK, Inc. and markets products and services under the FS banner.

Visit http://www.agris.coop and www.fssystem.com for more information.