About Us

INTRO

Who We Are

Southman Gleaners was established after a group of men were encouraged to set up a food drying facility in Southern MB (Manitoba), Canada. With an abundance of vegetables being grown here, many potatoes, onions and carrots do not meet grade requirements due to appearance issues.

This locally grown food can be repurposed and dehydrated into dried vegetable mixes. “This process ensures a longer shelf life and reduces the weight of the product. This enables economical shipping to different destinations around the world, feeding needy and hungry people.” The purpose of Southman Gleaners is to gather, process and dehydrate different foods, making our finished product available to Christian mission organizations for distribution. Vegetable mixes distributed by these organizations will enable those in need to work, thereby reducing poverty.


Southman Gleaners will select Christian organizations who have people on the ground to ensure proper distribution and the spreading of the Word of God.

We take our inspiration from Leviticus 23:22:

“And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: I am the LORD your God.”

Find us here at 24 Reinfeld St. N
Reinfeld, MB R6W 1L4

THE PURPOSE

Our Mission

The purpose of Southman Gleaners Inc. is to gather and process agricultural products so that value may be added to enable the feeding of hungry people. Our products of dehydrated vegetable mix will be distributed through Christian mission organizations.

HISTORY

How It Started

Written by George Wieler.

It all began with an individual who was involved with Peace Valley Gleaners, located in La Crete, Alberta. He had called me and encouraged me to get a Gleaners operation going in Southern Manitoba. Gleaners is an operation in which vegetables that are not suitable for retail are processed and dehydrated, then packaged and used to feed the hungry all over the world. Although I agreed that this area would be a good fit for such a project, I was reluctant to get involved.

Approximately two years later, he was coming to Southern Manitoba. He called again and asked me if I would be willing to set up an informational meeting. And so, I agreed to do the inviting, and he would do the presentation.

I went to the local coffee shop and introduced the idea to Abe Janzen. He thought it sounded like a good idea and was willing to come to the meeting. I found this very encouraging, and with the Holy Spirit nudging me, a little spark was beginning to ignite in me. The meeting date was set for June 22, 2022, at Outpost Grill. Fifteen people attended, including the city mayor, local vegetable growers, and business owners. We received very good support. At the end of the meeting, I was asked to carry the project forward. Abe Janzen agreed to help me. And so, our journey began. Many prayers were prayed for guidance and direction, and God has been faithful.

Abe and I met a few days later and planned another meeting. This was held on July 7, 2022, at the Triangle Oasis Restaurant. We had 11 people in attendance. A motion was made to establish a board that would be responsible for any legalities, charitable status, bylaws, location, and construction of a building until it was operational. The name of the organization was also discussed, and thus, Southman Gleaners was born. It was also decided to have monthly progress meetings.

In the following months, a corporation was established, our name was registered, and a lot of the legalities were taken care of. In September 2022, a property with a house and shop came up for sale in Reinfeld. With some renovations and upgrades, it looked like it could be a good fit for our project. The board was in agreement, and so I purchased the property. This was a huge step in making our project a reality. It was both exciting and nerve-racking. But with God in our corner, we moved forward.

In October of 2022, we took a trip to Medicine Hat, Alberta, and Oliver, BC, to check out the Gleaner operations there. This was a fact-finding trip to see how they operated and what was all involved. They were very encouraging and excited and willing to help in any way to get us started.

Now, we needed to generate funds to keep our project going. Receiving charity status is a process, and we were told it could take 1-2 years. We were made aware of another route we could take, which was through the Great Commission Foundation. They are an organization that is registered with CRA and specializes in helping charitable organizations. This was a process as well, and on January 26, 2023, we were approved and were ready to move forward.

By this time, a lot of the renovations had been completed. We had many generous and caring people working behind the scenes who supported us financially, donated supplies, and volunteered their time.

The next step was to start ordering the equipment and supplies we would need. We had a budget of $700,000. The biggest items were the dryer and the dicer. We placed the order for the dryer in May 2023. Both items were delivered in September and October of that same year.

On October 28, 2023, we had an open house/breakfast fundraiser to introduce our project to the community and surrounding areas. We received overwhelming support. Again, God was faithful, and we had received enough funds so that we were able to pay for everything we had purchased to this point.

Going forward, setting up the equipment, hookups, inspections, etc., brought us to mid-May of 2024. At this time, Manitoba Health informed us that we could operate on a temporary permit for two weeks in order to get started, establish a system, and figure out how everything would work. This was another exciting step. On May 29, 2024, they did an inspection while we were in full production.

With a few minor changes we had to comply with, we were given an official operation license. Praise the Lord! To arrive at this point was very rewarding!

On July 25, 2024, we had our Grand Opening. Again, we received overwhelming support and encouragement.

On August 24, 2024, we were ready to package the product for shipment. We were able to package 1,584 two-pound bags (158,400 servings). In September 2024, we packaged 1,296 two-pound bags (129,600 servings). In November 2024, we packaged 1,992 two-pound bags (199,200 servings). These three shipments were all sent to Ukraine through Faith Mission.

In December 2024, we shipped 3,072 bags (307,200 servings) to Mexico through Children of Hope. This makes a total of 794,400 servings to people in need. We also have additional product ready to be packaged.

In summary, from the time we started talking about this project until we started processing, it took one year and 11 months. It has been a huge project. But we have seen God at work every step of the way. All honor and glory go to Him. We have had so many people come alongside and help out, be it financially or by volunteering their time, and we are truly grateful for each and every one.

THE BOARD

Meet Our Board Members

  • Abe Janzen

    BOARD CHAIR

  • John Redekop

    VICE CHAIR

  • George Wieler

    SECRETARY TREASURER

  • Harold Thiessen

  • Ben Friesen

  • Waldemar Berg

  • Ike Wall

Meet Our Production Team

  • Richard Reimer

    General Manager

  • Ana Reimer

    Admin

FUTURE PLANS

What is in store for Southman Gleaners?

We have big plans for continued growth in the future.

In the past 6 months that we have been in operation we can already see that we have outgrown our facililty. We need a larger working area and a cooler for storing vegetables. We have anywhere from 10-30 volunteers daily from Monday to Thursday and up to 2 evening groups very week. We are receiving positive feedback . They are having fun and enjoying the fellowship while being able to help out with a worthy cause. Our goal is to provide our volunteers with a safe environment that makes it easy and comfortable for them to do the work.

Our plan is to build a 4500 sq ft addition to the existing building. This would add 1100 sq ft of drive in cooler space, 1300 sq ft consisting of a lunchroom, office, washrooms and a small kitchen, and 1600 ft of additional processing and washing space. There will be a mezzanine floor for storage. We hope to have an engineered drawing and quote for the project by April /2025.

We have purchased the one-acre property next to ours for more storage and parking space. We will be needing additional equipment such as an outside forklift, a pallet stacker, more vegetable bins, an insulated cargo trailer to haul produce and a spare vegetable dicer. We will also need to hire additional staff.

This project has been a lot bigger than I would ever have imagined. It has been a huge learning curve for all of us. It has also been very rewarding to see it all come together. Our prayer would be that with God’s help we could continue to grow and learn from each other. We have so many generous and caring people in our community and surrounding area. Altogether we can make these plans become a reality!!