Keystone Agricultural Producers (KAP) President Dan Mazier has announced that effective July 6, he has stepped down from the position to seek nomination for the Conservative Party of Canada in the riding of Dauphin - Swan River - Neepawa.

He'll be looking to fill the spot held by current MP Robert Sopuck, who announced back in May that he will not run in the next federal election to be held in October of 2019.

"This is something I have never considered until I had different friends and people who were taking notice of what I was saying and doing in interviews," said Mazier. "After some consideration I thought there was some things that I had developed, and I had developed a really good network over the years. I thought between working at the federal level and at the provincial level, our constituency did need some good voices in Ottawa and I think that I would be a really good candidate."

Mazier farms near Justice, Manitoba and was serving his fourth and final year as KAP president. He is also stepping down from the board of directors of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA). The recent passage of Bill C-49 was one of the highlights that Mazier talked about when looking back.

"I really was quite fascinated with the whole process at the federal level. There's things though, as a provincial farm group, you leave it up to the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, leave it up to a national organization. There's a lot of federal things that impact the riding here...there's a lot of things that the federal government could step up and help us out with."

KAP General Manager James Battershill says the farm lobby group will be holding a meeting July 31 to decide how to fill the vacant position. Bill Campbell of Minto and Jill Verwey of Portage la Prairie are KAP's vice-presidents.