There are 55 million bushels of soybeans grown annually in an 11-county area surrounding Crookston. The Ag Innovation Campus is designed to be an incubator of ideas and the development of new products. The concept for this project began in 2018. Board Chair Mike Skaug says it is now becoming a reality. “We had a tough time getting started because of COVID and we’ve had some big cost increases because of supply issues. Everything is going along pretty smoothly right now; it’s more predictable now than it was even a month ago.” Farmers Union Enterprises, which is made up of the Farmers Union organizations in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, and Wisconsin, signed on as a major sponsor of the Ag Innovation Campus. FEI is a very diverse business with interests in everything from pet food ingredients to rendering. “They made a sizeable contribution financially and they’re going to have a seat on our board of directors.” The Minnesota Soybean Growers Association, Minnesota Soybean Research and Promotion Council and the Agricultural Utilization Research Institute are the other partners for the Crookston project.
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