ACC Agribusiness students celebrating after annual competition

Second year Agribusiness students at Assiniboine Community College (ACC) culminated months of teamwork at the annual Agribusiness Plan Competition, held this past week on campus.

In addition to bragging rights, the winning team received $1,200. That team consisted of Donovan Hickson, Laura Sytnyk and Charlee McLaughlin-Ventnor, who developed a plan for a fictional company named Agricultural Training Farm of Manitoba.

I'm very proud of my team and how hard we've worked the last few months to achieve this amazing win,” said McLaughlin-Ventnor.

All second year Agribusiness students formed teams to prepare business plans for fictional agriculture businesses. Students kicked off their projects in year one and were encouraged to begin collecting information during their co-op work experience over the summer.

There’s tremendous value in students working through the challenges and complexities of a complete plan from start to finish,” said Agribusiness instructor Terry Powell. “They have to think through all aspects of their business model as well as challenges and opportunities in the marketplace to deliver a strategy for success.”

Along the way, students were tasked with finding suitable mentors in the business community to provide real world expertise in operations, business management and accounting.

Each of the 10 teams presented their plans to peers during Ag Days week this past January. The four top-ranked teams from that event continued on to present at the final competition round this past week at ACC’s Victoria Avenue East Campus. Graduates of the Agribusiness program judged those presentations and selected the order of winning teams.

For the third year in a row, Redfern Farm Services Ltd. has contributed $3,450 in monetary awards for the top four plans and presentations.

“It’s always exciting to see an idea and a concept come together in a finished project as all four of those projects did,” said Ray Redfern, owner of Redfern Farm Services Ltd. “It really does prepare those participants for tomorrow’s world.”

The other three teams in the finals developed business plans under the names Synergy Silage Ltd., Western Prairie Seed Cleaning Ltd., and Prairie West Butchers Ltd.

Agriculture training has been a significant focus at ACC since the early 1980s. The two-year Agribusiness diploma program averages over 30 graduates a year and has over 600 alumni. For more information on ACC’s Agribusiness program, visit assiniboine.net/agribusiness.

A full list of team members and their hometowns are as follows:

First Place ($1,200) — Agricultural Training Farm of Manitoba

• Donovan Hickson – Forrest
• Charlee McLaughlin-Ventnor – Rivers
• Laura Sytnyk – Shoal Lake

Second Place ($1,050) — Synergy Silage Ltd.

• Sydney Hore – Wawanesa
• Brayden Kreshewski – Minnedosa
• Brandon Smith - Plumas
• Aaron King - Killarney

Third Place ($750) — Western Prairie Seed Cleaning Ltd.

• Maggie Funk - Roblin
• Taylor Schettler - Plumas
• Carley Paulenko - Roblin

Fourth Place ($450) — Prairie West Butchers Ltd.

• Jesse Bernard - Killarney
• Josh Wood - Minto
• Andrea Poirier – Reston