Portage la Prairie and District Chamber of Commerce president Dave Omichinski attended the Province's announcement yesterday of the new pea protein extraction facility that's slated to be built in Portage la Prairie.

He says, "For Portage and area, I mean, this is just blow-your-socks-off news. This is a fantastic announcement. It is one of the largest investments that have ever been made in the Province of Manitoba."

Omichinski explains the impact includes the addition of 150 new jobs for the area, and putting Portage and the area on the map in a significantly larger agricultural way.

"We have the capacity, we have the farmland, and we have the skills," he adds. "This is a really, really good news story."