The Levinoff-Colbex plant that Quebec’s dairy farmers bought
and went bankrupt is now up for auction.
Barliant Auctions will auction the facilities and equipment
Tuesday, Dec. 2.
In an advertisement in Meatingplace Magazine, which is
highly respected in the North American meat-packing industry, Barliant calls
the plant:
“56,000 square feet complete state of the art cattle
slaughter facility;
“4,750 cattle per week capacity;
“Largest cull cattle slaughter processing facility in
Eastern Canada.”
Farmers bought the plant in the aftermath of a ban on
exporting cattle arising from the discovery that an Alberta cow had died of
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE, or mad cow’s disease).
Prices for cull dairy cows collapsed to close to nothing. In
Ontario, Gencor, a cattle-inseminating business mainly for dairy farmers,
bought a packing plant in Kitchener and upgraded it to federal meat inspection
standards to process cull cows.
That plant also ended in bankruptcy after the border to the
U.S. re-opened.
