GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA, U.S. — Record profits were recorded at North Dakota Mill & Elevator in the year ended June 30.

Fiscal 2015 profits at the milling company totaled $16.6 million, up 25% from $13.3 million in fiscal 2014. Sales during the year totaled $305 million.

Shipments during the year totaled 12.5 million cwts of flour, up 2.7% from the year before, and the flour mill ground 26.7 million bushels of wheat.

The North Dakota Mill & Elevator is owned by the state of North Dakota, the only U.S. milling company owned by a state. The business is overseen by the North Dakota’s three-member Industrial Commission — Governor Jack Dalrymple as chairman, Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring and Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem. 

The mill transferred approximately 25% of the company’s profits — $3,408,600 — to the state’s general fund and $833,767 to the Agriculture Products Utilization Fund.  The remaining profits are used for mill operations.

In some recent years, transfers from the mill to the general fund have been even higher, sometimes exceeding 50% of profits. Over the past year, the Industrial Commission announced plans to spend $20 million on a milling capacity expansion at North Dakota Mill & Elevator. The project, which will raise capacity by 30%, will widen the mill’s lead as the largest flour mill in the U.S. When the addition is completed, North Dakota Mill will have nearly 50,000 cwts of daily flour milling capacity, about two thirds larger than the nation’s second largest mill.

More recently, the company plans to spend $4.4 million to add grain storage capacity to the Grand Forks complex.