Hay River’s Polar Egg farm expects to triple its egg production once an estimated $15-million construction project is complete at the end of May.
The project, funded in part by a $1.2-million loan from CanNor, includes the construction of a new barn and egg grading facility that will house about 100,000 chickens, in addition to the 50,000 that live in an existing barn.
The farm was purchased by Matt Vane and Jeff Bisschop of Knutsford Ventures Inc in 2023.
“I’ve been in poultry farming my whole life,” said Vane. He said he was born and raised on a broiler farm in British Columbia, then began egg farming just under 15 years ago.
Vane operates two other farms in Chilliwack and Kamloops, BC. He splits his time between the three locations, visiting Hay River about once a month.
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“It’s been really cool getting to know the Northwest Territories scene and that community,” said Vane.
Currently, eggs produced at the Hay River facility are available at North West Company stores in the NWT like Northern and NorthMart. Vane hopes to introduce them in more chains but said that process can be lengthy.
He said he also wants the company’s eggs to be distributed through NWT school food programs, seeing that as an opportunity to educate youth about local agriculture and the nutritional value of the product.
With bird flu having recently driven up egg prices in the United States as farms try to cope with the disease, Vane said the operation of farms in different regions allows other facilities to pick up some of the slack if one area is affected.
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In a time of international trade uncertainty, Vane also believes it’s beneficial to have a Canadian-made product that will continue to be available to Canadians, no matter the geopolitical scuffles.
The egg farm expansion is one of several agriculture and food security projects under way in Hay River.
Last fall, the municipality celebrated the opening of a new fish plant that officials say will ultimately generate higher returns for fishers.
In January, United Way NWT awarded the town $850,000 to support the remediation of the former Northern Farm Training Institute site and “re-establish Hay River as the agriculture hub of the North.”
The farm training institute dissolved in 2023. Its remaining assets at the site burned in a wildfire later that year.
A new agriculture newsletter produced by the town states the remediation project is set to begin this spring. Respondents to a survey conducted last year said they wanted the land to be available for new and existing farmers to access.
Glenn Smith, senior administrator for the Town of Hay River, said conversations are being had about integrating compost into a new solid waste facility that could potentially benefit agriculture as well.
Smith said projects like these – and the expansion of the Polar Egg farm – help put Hay River “on the map” as a location that’s viable for agriculture.
The increase of production at the egg farm is “good for the North as a whole,” said Smith.
“It’s probably one of the few real commercial success stories for agriculture in the North.”
