Manitoba's Clean Environment Commission has formally put on hold public hearings into OlyWest's proposal to build a hog processing plant in Winnipeg's St. Boniface neighbourhood, after two of the proposal's three partners pulled out in December.

Commission chairman Terry Sargeant said Monday that OlyWest must submit a revised business plan to the provincial government before public hearings on the proposal would begin.

"These hearings are fairly costly, and for a proposal like this … it's paid for by the taxpayers and they can easily exceed a quarter of a million dollars," Sargeant said.

"I don't think it's right to expend that kind of money unless there's a solid business plan in place."

The business plan and licence application for the OlyWest proposal — originally a partnership of Quebec-based Olymel, Big Sky Farms of Saskatchewan and Hytek Ltd. of La Broquerie, Man. — was submitted to the province in August.

But on Dec. 5, Olymel and Big Sky Farms announced they would withdraw from the project, blaming in part a moratorium on new and expanding hog operations that the province imposed a month earlier.

Hytek, the sole remaining backer and full owner of the OlyWest proposal, has yet to submit a new business plan to the province.