Toronto - Maple Leaf Foods, Canada's largest food processor, said unionized voters at its Burlington, Ontario, hog processing plant voted to end a nearly four-month-old strike.
Striking members of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union agreed to accept the company's final contract offer, paving the way for a C$30 million expansion of the kill-and-cut plant, company officials said.
"We are pleased the employees chose to ratify this agreement, and Maple Leaf plans a C$30 million expansion in that facility very soon," Maple Leaf president and chief executive Michael McCain told Reuters in a phone interview.
The Toronto-based company said in February it would close the plant on March 20 if employees rejected the company's final offer.
Maple Leaf now plans to add a second shift at the Burlington plant to bring weekly kill capacity up to 65,000 hogs once the plant start-up is phased in over the next two to three weeks, McCain said.
"The C$30 million expansion will be done as quickly as we can possibly execute. It will be measured in months. It will involve the latest technology, broadly distributed throughout the plant," McCain said.
Management's final offer included a new wage scale of between C$10 and C$21 an hour, a guaranteed work week, an improved pension plan and a substantial buyout package of up to C$33,000 per person.
Under the old contract, employees earned an average wage of C$25.08, including benefits, with the least skilled person earning C$16.58.
The 900 Burlington employees have been on strike since November 15 after management offered a buyout to current employees and lower wages to new employees.
In late November, Maple Leaf closed down its Edmonton, Alberta, hog processing plant after 850 employees went on strike.
Norfolk, Virginia-based Smithfield Foods Inc earlier this month offered to buy the Burlington plant if it were closed.
Maple Leaf rejected that offer, and said if the plant is closed it would take the equipment to its new pork plant in Brandon, Manitoba. Maple Leaf and Smithfield have been in a bidding war for food processor Schneider Corp.
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