UGG today announced it has signed a letter of intent respecting an agreement to purchase the shares of Paradise Hill Agro Ltd., a crop input retailer located in northwestern Saskatchewan. Paradise Hill Agro sells seed, crop p rotection products, and fertilizer in a market that extends from Paradise Hill to St. Walburg, Makwa and Meadow Lake.

UGG already has strong representation south of the North Saskatchewan River with locations in
Marwayne, Paradise Valley, Lloydminster and Maidstone. The addition of Paradise Hill Agro will
provide UGG with a core location to the north of the river.

"We're committed to expanding UGG's services in this area and we want to be in a position to meet farmers' business needs, now and in the future,'' said Garth Rowswell, UGG Territory Manager.

Paradise Hill Agro will begin offering UGG's full line of services over the next few months. These
services include UGG's Production Credit Program and the sale of Proven Seed varieties. UGG will provide local producers with markets for their grain by of fering farm gate trucking service to new and existing facilities to the west and south.

The management and staff of Paradise Hill Agro will join UGG and continue to operate the business in cooperation with other UGG locations.

"This is a good opportunity for UGG to introduce itself to the marketplace,'' said Kevin Meagher,
President of Paradise Hill Agro.

"Customers can look forward to continued good service on their crop inputs and a new, aggressive competitor for their grain business,'' said Meagher.

The purchase of Paradise Hill Agro is expected to be completed by April 1999, subject to signing of a purchase agreement and satisfaction of due diligence conditions. Terms of the deal are not being disclosed.

This will be the 16th independent crop input business purchased by UGG in the past 15 months and the 6th in Saskatchewan. These purchases complement UGG's aggressive investment in grain handling facilities in Saskatchewan. Since 1997, UGG has built or ex panded grain elevators in Dixon (Humboldt), Melville, Biggar, Wilkie, Congress, Carrot River, Redvers, Canora and Valparaiso (Tisdale).

UGG is one of western Canada's largest agribusiness firms. Founded in 1906, the Winnipeg based Company is diversified into grain merchandising, crop input sales and distribution, livestock
production services and farm business communications. UGG is publ icly traded on the Toronto
Stock Exchange and Winnipeg Stock Exchange, under the symbol ``UGG''.

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