The CEO of Canadian pork and poultry packer Olymel has died of a “sudden and virulent cancer” at age 71, his company reported Friday morning.
Rejean Nadeau, the CEO of Sollio Co-operative’s meatpacking and processing arm since 1996, died Thursday at his home at Rougemont, Que., about 25 km south of St-Hyacinthe, Olymel said in a release.
Olymel said its board had been informed of Nadeau’s “inability to perform his duties due to illness” just a week earlier, on Oct. 7.
Yanick Gervais, Olymel’s senior vice-president of operations, was asked at that time to “assume the duties of CEO for as long as deemed necessary,” the company added.
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Quebec’s hog farmer association, les Eleveurs de porcs du Quebec, reacted “with sadness” to the news in a statement posted on Twitter Friday morning, describing Nadeau as an “emblematic” figure in agrifood.
Nadeau, the organization said, had “devoted a good part of his professional life” to the pork sector right up until his death.
EPQ president David Duval said it’s partly due to Nadeau’s business sense that Olymel has been able to succeed on a global scale where other businesses fell by the wayside. The strength of the sector is in its synergies, he added, and Nadeau in that sense was a “longtime collaborator” with the hog industry.
Nadeau joined Sollio, then known as Coop federee, in 1976. During his tenure as the meatpacking arm’s CEO, he merged the Quebec-based co-operative’s pork and poultry businesses under the Olymel banner in 1998.
He expanded the business through acquisitions such as the Fletcher’s Fine Foods pork plant at Red Deer, Alta., now Canada’s largest hog slaughter and processing plant, in 2001; Supraliment, the meat division of Groupe Brochu, in 2005; Saskatchewan hog producer Big Sky Farms and Alberta producer Pinnacle Farms, in 2013 and 2016 respectively; Trois-Rivieres sausage maker La Fernandiere, in 2016; Triomphe Foods and Pinty’s in 2018; and Quebec processor F. Menard last year.
The company also expanded its reach through joint-venture partnerships during Nadeau’s tenue, such as turkey processor Unidindon, with Exceldor; New Brunswick chicken slaughter and processing operation Sunnymel, with Westco; and pork processor Lucyporc, with Atrahan Transformation and Groupe Robitaille.
“In less than 20 years, Rejean Nadeau spearheaded an expansion that has given Olymel an active presence in Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick, Saskatchewan and Alberta,” the company said.
Nadeau “has always taken great pride in promoting Quebec and Canadian products on both the domestic and international markets,” Olymel vice-president Paul Beauchamp said in Friday’s release.
In a “final farewell” message to Olymel management and employees, Nadeau was quoted as saying “Pay attention to your colleagues, smile, question your attitude and your way of leading, and be open to change: at times it will be technological and will push our business model to evolve; you will see our old face-to-face model become hybrid; at times the path of growth and development will send shockwaves through the organization, and in the end, management will experience a new boom under new leadership.”
Those objectives, he said, “are all challenges that I know you are capable of meeting, like a tight-knit family.”
Nadeau’s family will “soon” announce the date and place for a memorial service, the company added. — Glacier FarmMedia Network
