Smithfield Foods has set out plans to replace its more than 100-year-old South Dakota facility with a new packaged meats and fresh pork processing plant in Sioux Falls.
In a statement yesterday (16 February), the US meat processor, which is owned by China’s WH Group, said it has begun the approvals process for the new factory, which it said will be the “most modern of its kind” in the country.
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Smithfield plans to build the facility in Foundation Park, an industrial park where the existing plant is located, subject to approvals by authorities.
The investment has initially been estimated at up to $1.3bn over the next three years.
Smithfield Foods’ president and CEO Shane Smith said: “This highly automated facility will represent a major investment in Sioux Falls, the state of South Dakota and the future of American agriculture.
“Smithfield’s investment supports our long-term strategy of continuing to grow and optimise our value-added packaged meats and fresh pork operations to deliver innovation, convenience and value to our customers.”
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By GlobalDataOnce complete, the new facility is expected to deliver “significant efficiency gains” across Smithfield’s fresh pork and packaged meats operations.
The project would support independent hog farmers, corn and soybean producers, and other parts of the agricultural supply chain in South Dakota and the surrounding region, the company said.
Smithfield currently employs 3,200 people in Sioux Falls.
Site work for the new plant is expected to start this spring, with initial groundbreaking planned for the first half of next year.
Smithfield said production is expected to begin at the end of 2028.
The proposed Sioux Falls development follows several recent facility closures by Smithfield.
Earlier this month, the company confirmed it would close its Springfield, Massachusetts, plant in a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) notice filed with the state. The closure will affect 190 employees.
In 2024, Smithfield closed a ham-boning facility in Altoona, Iowa, impacting 314 jobs. The company also shut down its Charlotte, North Carolina, pork processing plant in 2023.
