The new Ag Innovation Campus (AIC) in Crookston, Minnesota held its grand opening Thursday, with the goal of providing a platform to deliver new crops and processing technologies from benchtop to commercialization.

“When completed, this facility is really going to change agriculture as a whole,” said Tom Slunecka, Acting AIC CEO and CEO of Minnesota Soybean Research & Promotion Council. “We’re building something new and different, at the right time and the right place.”

As a not-for-profit crush facility, the AIC will produce an estimated 240 tons of soybean meal daily, equaling a grand total of 62,400 tons of soybean meal per year. With three independently operated mechanic crush systems, the AIC will be able to crush organic, non-GMO and GMO soybeans.

Minnesota Agriculture Commissioner Thom Petersen was thrilled to see the progress on the facility, which he had been working on with the soybean producers since he came into office in 2019. “There’s so many opportunities for agriculture right now, the next ten years are going to be the most exciting time.”

Listen to the ceremony remarks with Slunecka to start and Petersen to wrap up with others in between who made the project a reality, including AIC board chair and local farmer Mike Skaug, MSR&PC Board chair Tom Frisch, State Rep. Debra Kiel, Minnesota State Sen. Mark Johnson, and many others.

AIC grand opening remarks 54:38

Learn more about AIC in these interviews below:
AIC interview with Tom Slunecka, AIC Acting CEO 8:37

AIC interview with Kent Meyers, AIC Plant Manager 6:33

Ag Innovation Campus Grand Opening Photo Album