MASC offices reopen in Virden, Shoal Lake

VIRDEN — Two Manitoba Agricultural Services Corporation offices — closed under the Progressive Conservatives — have reopened in Westman.

Agriculture Minister Ron Kostyshyn visited Virden on Friday for a ribbon-cutting ceremony at one of the new offices, with the other one opening in Shoal Lake.

“It’s definitely an opportunity to celebrate,” Kostyshyn said.

The two new MASC office locations will provide in-person services for clients who are in the agriculture industry.

The provincial Crown corporation provides farmers with services like insurance, lending and data. Until now, the only way to access the services in the area was online or by driving to urban centres like Brandon.

Farmers are regaining the service after the former PC government closed the offices in 2021.

Kostyshyn referred to closures briefly during his speech.

“They closed ’em, we’re opening ’em,” he said.

The Virden grand-opening event was held inside the new MASC office at 297 Seventh Ave. South. Dozens of people were in attendance, including Municipal and Northern Relations Minister Glen Simard, MASC chair John Plohman and Association of Manitoba Municipalities vice-president Scott Phillips.

The Shoal Lake office is at 312 Elm St.

There will be four full-time employees each at the Virden and Shoal Lake branches, Kostyshyn said. In total, the professional impact were eight net new jobs across the two offices and some internal movement of existing employees to provide the service.

Virden Mayor Tina Williams told the Sun community members have been excited about the opening.

Since the new MASC sign went up on the building this week, she has heard lots of positive feedback from farmers, she said. The reason the office is important, she added, is because a lot of farmers prefer to deal face-to-face rather than over the phone or online.

“I did speak with a younger one who said she was quite happy that it’s coming here,” Williams said. “It’s nice to see people’s faces … Farmers want to walk into a place and see a person.”

The impact this will have on Virden, she expects, is more traffic.

When Brandon was the nearest MASC office, it meant that people would have to leave the community to make the trip for insurance services. Now that Virden has an office, she expects that traffic to stay in town, which should be good for business.

In an interview with the Sun after his speech, Kostyshyn said the offices were located in spots where they would reduce the distance that many farmers had to travel for service. The province looked at a map and chose Virden and Shoal Lake because those towns would bring services as close as possible to the largest number of clients, he said.

“You can’t beat personalized intervention,” he said. “There’s a lot more accomplished than going on social media and online. It’s a lot more of a personal service.”

The offices were announced by Premier Wab Kinew at Ag Days 2025 in Brandon. Reintroducing two offices this year in Virden and Shoal Lake was “another step” toward fulfilling his campaign promise to spread provincial services into rural areas, Kinew said at the time.

» cmcdowell@brandonsun.com