how to maintain leading spaces for a text column

[stanley]

I am using oledb to load the data to an excel file from a text file. When the load happens oledb removes the leading spaces for a text field.

I want to maintain the leading spaces for the text field.

can some one pls tell me how to maintain it? The connection parameter I am using is:

"Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;" & _
"Data Source=" & xls_file & ";Extended Properties=""Excel 8.0;HDR=YES;"""