It came as a total surprise to the operators of the Shell bulk plant in Tisdale that the company is withdrawing from bulk sales. Shell claimed that it can not sustain the competition in this province and will continue to operate its retail outlets but bulk sales ends at the end of the month.

Tisdale had up until this announcement four companies providing fuel to the agricultural businesses of the area; Co-op, ESS0 and Petro-Canada will have the market with Shell out of the picture.

Yesterday, another take over will affect the agricultural market in the Tisdale area as the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool has formally taken over Agricore replacing its board of directors and delisting the company from the Toronto Stock Exchange. There was some talk that in some locations like Tisdale where Agricore and the Wheat Pool compete that James Richardsons from Winnipeg may take over some facilities. We will have to wait and see how this shakes out and like this move by Shell it too will have profound affects on the competitive marketplace.