Last year brought some bad news as far as the manufacturing sector in the Quinte region went.
Chief Executive Officer of the Quinte Economic Development Commission Chris King told the Commission’s Board of Directors Thursday that the closures of Nestle and Sonoco in Quinte West hit hard, as did the closure of Hexo Corporation in Belleville.
However, there was a silver lining in the Quinte West story as new manufacturers were found for both Sonoco and Nestle.
All Season Fencing has been renovating the Sonoco building as has Quinte Custom Foods in the Nestle’s plant.
King said the Quinte Custom Foods oration could eventually become larger than Nestle was.
And King says there is lots of positive action going on in the background in the local manufacturing sector.
Audio Player
“Many of them are talking about new product mandates, new equipment, new technology, new lines and even some plant expansions so there’s
some good news from existing companies and that’s where most of our growth is going to come from, from existing companies expanding.”
While there have been no announcements about the Hexo building a huge transportation/logistics centre is now under construction in Belleville.
Manufacturing is the number one employer in the Quinte region and the area including Belleville, Quinte West and Brighton was estimated to have $13 billion in total economic activity, with half of that coming from the manufacturing sector.
There were other investments/expansions of note in 2022. Those included Brighton Truss, Hannafin Automation & Industrial Controls, Capital Movers & Storage, Sprague Foods, GlobalMed, Premier Tech, the Quinte Museum of Natural History, and visit by a delegation from Lahr, Germany.
Meanwhile Mayor Jim Harrison of Quinte West praised realtor Jamie Troke of Ekort Realty who put together the sale of the former Sonoco plant to All Season Fencing and also brought The SAB Group of Companies Limited to the city.
