Case Studies
ConAgra Foods
Northeast Louisiana was instrumental in the recent announcement by ConAgra Foods to build a modern food processing and packaging facility in Delhi, Louisiana. The plant will provide directly 500 jobs for the region, and is slated to begin operation in September 2010.
Visit www.LambWeston.com/Delhi
Find out more below.
Sept. 2010 target date for opening
By Matthew Hamilton
ConAgra Foods Lamb Weston has yet to announce the site of its sweet potato processing plant in Delhi, but company and state officials are eager to begin building as soon as possible.
Lamb Weston senior financial officer David Richardson said the company hopes to start plant operations by fall 2010.
"We have to bring in the harvest," Richardson said. "We ask everyone to do what they can to help us get that."
The $210 million facility, the first large-scale sweet potato processing plant in the world, Gov. Bobby Jindal said, will be built in two phases. The first phase, costing $156 million, is scheduled to be finish by late 2010. The company plans to complete a second phase costing $55 million to $100 million by February 2014.
Kelsey D. Short, director of agriculture, forestry and food industries for the state office of economic development, said the plant will encompass around 200,000 square feet.
Short said pouring the facility's concrete foundation by late September is critical to avoid the rainy season. The plant will also require a railroad spur off the Kansas City Southern line and possible road expansion near the site.
Lamb Weston president Jeff DeLapp said processing sweet potatoes requires different energy and water levels compared to regular potatoes. He said the facility will use state-of-the-art technology to achieve those requirements and attain the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification. The LEED certification, administered by the U.S. Green Building Council, measures energy savings, water efficiency, carbon dioxide emissions reduction and other standards of sustainability.
To accommodate the plant's water demands, the town of Delhi will have to increase its water capacity more than twofold.
Delhi Mayor Lynn Lewis said the town treats 750,000 gallons of water a day for its own use. He estimated the plant would need at least 2 million gallons a day to function. To pay for water and sewer expansion, the town plans to generate $15 million by selling revenue bonds. The loan will then be paid off through a special user-fee agreement with Lamb Weston.
Short said the plant would probably start hiring 60 to 90 days before September 2010. The job would require semi-skilled labor and employees would work three shifts, allowing the plant to operate 24 hours a day.
Lamb Weston to announce processing plant, 500 jobs in Delhi
By Greg Hilburn
Conagra Foods Lamb Weston, a leading producer of frozen french fries and prepared potato products, will announce today plans to build a sweet potato processing plant near Delhi that will create a minimum of 500 new jobs over five years, state officials confirmed.
Gov. Bobby Jindal and company officials plan to make the announcement at 11 a.m. at the Delhi Civic Center.
Economic Development Secretary Stephen Moret said the jobs will average $34,000-$35,000 per year plus benefits. He said an LSU economic impact study will show the project also will produce at least 1,400 additional indirect jobs.
"It's an exciting project for so many reasons, especially for a region that has been one of our most economically challenged," Moret said.
Moret said Lamb Weston will become the largest private employer in northeastern Louisiana's Delta, excluding Ouachita Parish.
The company has narrowed its list of potential plant sites to two or three locations in the Delhi area outside the town limits.
Moret said the state has committed between $32.4 million and $37.4 million from the economic development megafund toward construction of the facility. The incentive package must be approved by the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget. Total investment from the company and state into the plant will be between $211 million and $256 million.
Under its contract with the state, Lamb Weston must employ a minimum of 275 workers when the facility goes into production by 2011 and 500 workers by 2015.
"This is a project that can change the face of the Delta," said state Sen. Francis Thompson, D-Delhi, who has been working on recruiting the company for two years. "It will have an enormous impact. Words can't describe how I feel about this project."
Lamb Weston's plant will be the company's first facility dedicated to year-round processing of sweet potatoes.
Lev Dawson of Delhi, who is the largest sweet potato producer in the United States, said he has worked with the company to prove that sweet potatoes can be stored successfully for up to a year.
"This is going to be tremendous for our farmers and our community; it's been a dream of mine for so long," said Dawson, who farms about 4,000 acres of sweet potatoes and sold 800 truckloads to the company's Oregon facility last year. "Our year-round storage helped trigger their idea to build a dedicated facility."
Dawson said he will work with the company to provide more such storage on site. Dawson said he expects Louisiana sweet potato acreage to grow exponentially once the plant is in production.
Moret said the state's incentive package will also include its Fast Start program, which is designed to provide a turnkey work-force solution. Fast Start was instrumental in packages that lured V Vehicle Co. to Ouachita Parish and Gardner Denver's expansion at its Monroe Air Industrial Park facility.
He said the company plans an aggressive construction schedule that will put the plant into production no later than Jan. 1, 2011, "and hopefully sooner than that."
Moret said the company was also attracted to Louisiana because of the LSU AgCenter's Sweet Potato Research Station in Chase.
"They've been quietly working with the research station for months," he said.
The state's contract requiring minimum employment runs through 2025, Moret said, or 15 years after the plant begins processing sweet potatoes.
"The wins we've had with V Vehicle, Gardner Denver and now Conagra Foods Lamb Weston are building economic momentum in the region and confidence in its work force," Moret said.
Impact to ripple beyond Richland
By Stephen Largen
Tana Trichel, president of the Northeast Louisiana Economic Alliance, is confident the arrival of ConAgra Foods Lamb Weston's sweet potato processing plant near Delhi will have far-reaching effects on the regional and state economy.
"This community will change," she said.
"If you look at this community five years from now you won't recognize it. There will be apartments. There will be other businesses. It's going to make a big impact."
Wednesday's announcement that the plant will locate in Richland Parish also highlighted the results of an LSU economic impact study that suggests the new facility will provide an injection of $2.1 to $2.4 billion in new state economic output from 2009 to 2025.
The study estimates that at least 500 on-site jobs will be created and at least 1,400 indirect jobs will follow.
At least $70 million in new state tax revenues, excluding increased corporate income taxes, will come during the course of the cooperative endeavor agreement between the company and the state.
LSU estimates local governments will receive $19 million to $22 million in new tax revenues over the life of the agreement.
The new facility's average salary of about $35,00 plus benefits will be about 30 percent higher than the current average salary per job in Richland Parish, and about 44 percent higher than the current per capita income in the parish.
Trichel said the facility will have impacts beyond Richland Parish.
"They'll hire probably for a good 30-mile radius," she said.
"So it's going to catch every single parish. And that's an easily commutable distance for anyone who wants a good job. The jobs have benefits, 401ks, savings, health insurance and those jobs are harder and harder for a business to accommodate. Per capita income going up, the collateral jobs that will come with it will just build the tax base and it'll help the schools, the police department, the fire department, and it will help economic development."
Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain said the facility will be a boon for the state's economy.
"When you take and raise an agriculture product and you process and sell it, those dollars circulate eight to 10 times in the economy," he said. "This means a billion dollars to Louisiana's agricultural economy."
Lev Dawson of Delhi, who farms 4,000 acres of sweet potatoes in Richland and Franklin Parishes, said ConAgra could also expand in the area if the processing plant is a success.
"I wouldn't be surprised if ConAgra — if they have a good experience here — wouldn't add to their product line," he said.
"They tend to do that. Meaning they might be able to make some soybean products, some rice products and we also grow a lot of wheat. This sort of product factory — they've got a lot of land — they can keep adding on to it. I wouldn't be surprised if we got up to a lot more than 500 jobs."
The area population could also expand.
"They tell me that when they move into small communities like this it usually increases the population by about 2,000," Dawson said.
"They are five miles from the poorest zip code in the United States. So people have an opportunity to work now."
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