HASTINGS, NEBRASKA, US — Columbia Grain International is making its first-ever, small-pack pulse line for the consumer market at a facility in Hastings. The products will contain peas, lentils, chickpeas and dry beans. Columbia Grain will grow, procure, clean and process the products for domestic food and pet food markets as well as for export.

Columbia Grain expects to process over 50,000 tonnes of pulses per year at the facility, a 60,000-square-foot processing building with a capacity of 286,000 bushels. Peavey originally built the facility in Hastings in 1979. Columbia Grain acquired it from Gavilon. Railroad lines for both BNSF and Union Pacific serve the facility.

“The Hastings, Neb., facility will provide a consistent market and opportunity for expansion to pulse producers in South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming and Kansas,” said Jeff Van Pevenage, president and chief executive officer of Portland, Oregon, US-based Columbia Grain. “With the expansion of acres in this area over the last five years, Hastings, Neb., will give both CGI and local producers a great opportunity to expand into this area and bring further value to local pulse growers.”