By Geoff Smith (@smithco on Twitter)

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Taber area feeding Canada’s sweet tooth

Aug 17, 2017 | 8:28 AM

LETHBRIDGE – Roses are red, violets are blue, sugar is sweet, and Taber is the source of a lot of it.

In fact, Lantic, Inc.’s Taber facility is the only sugar beet processing factory in Canada. It produces Rogers granulated sugar, icing sugar, and liquid sugar for commercial customers like beverage bottlers or beekeeprs. Beet pulp is also produced, sold domestically and exported to the Far East. 

“We do produce the highest quality crop in North America here,” explains Andrew Llewelyn-Jones, operations manager for Lantic. “We have some really good reasons for that. The main factors are, we have lots of sunshine during the growing season. We have long days. And we have plenty of irrigation water.”

Sugar beet processing in southern Alberta dates back to the first plant in Raymond in the 1920s. Construction began on the Taber plant in 1948 and it produced its first sugar during the 1950-51 season. Production in Picture Butte and Raymond was later consolidated in Taber.

Llewelyn-Jones has been with the operation for 30 years, but aside from the technology, not a lot has changed in sugar beet production.

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“Within the process itself there’s always changing technology. But the process of extracting sugar from sugar beets has remained essentially the same,” he explains.

There have, however, been big improvements on the crop production side, with average yields increasing from the low 20s to the high 20s in tonnes/acre. Llewelyn-Jones adds the company pays growers based on quality, and that has improved the quality of the beets.

When Lethbridge News Now visited the plant in the spring, it was during the juice campaign. The beets from the previous growing season had already been processed, and sugar was now being produced from the thick juice stored in tanks.

“Normally we would be starting the harvest in mid-September-ish, and the plant would start a few days later,” Llewelyn-Jones said, “and then we would just be running 24/7 right until we finish processing, which normally is the end of January, early February, with the size of crops we’ve been getting the last few years.”

The plant has nearly 100 full-time employees and adds temporary workers during the peak season, totalling nearly 400 people.

After nearly a century in southern Alberta, Llewelyn-Jones said the company intends to continue in the area with its core sugar business. He feels a sentiment towards natural foods benefits them.

“Sugar has a health issue, but we fully believe the sugar itself, in moderation, is something that really is not harmful to the human body,” he said. “We just extract the sugar out of the sugar beet, and nothing is added in that sense. It is what comes out in concentrated form and it is, from that point of view, a natural healthy product.”

Check out other stories is the Food for Thought series:

Food for Thought – Taking a closer look at local food processors

Food for Thought – Western Canada snacks on southern Alberta products

Food for Thought – Exporting Canadian whisky to the world