With another case of PEDv in Manitoba and the federal government not willing to listen to the hog industry about the need for heightened biosecurity as it pertains to washing trailers coming back from the United States, company, farm, and personal biosecurity becomes even more important.

Rick Peters, the Vice President Operations with Steve’s Livestock Transport, says efforts to contain PED virus have pushed attention to biosecurity to a new level.

In April, Manitoba Pork recognized SLT with one of two Manitoba Pork 2016 Pork Industry Awards for their continuous pursuit and exceptional implementation of cutting-edge technologies to ensure the highest standard of animal care and biosecurity in Manitoba’s livestock transport industry

Peters says PED hasn’t been the only virus out there but two years ago PED heightened awareness of the importance of biosecurity and prompted the industry to re-evaluate every detail. “In terms of biosecurity our focus is to put out clean equipment each and every time,” he said.

“We continuously look for ways to improve biosecurity at all levels, not just our equipment but also with the people, how they work, with where we source bedding, where we have trailer scrape-out locations, more traffic flows in our yards, how we set that up, continuous training with drivers, wash bay employees, maintenance staff, that’s our focus.”

Eight or nine years ago, Steve’s started using dry bays, realizing that disinfectant is good but it needs to be dried to be effective. Then, with PED a couple of years ago, they needed to make some changes adding baking bays, heating to 160 to 170 degrees which essentially kills any viruses that may be lingering after a wash.

“We also developed undercarriage wash systems for trailers,” said Peters. “Trailers are low to the ground and we recognized that was one of the areas that was almost impossible to wash because they are so low to the ground.

We looked at designs of wash bay construction, not only the wash bay construction but even the effluent that comes out of trailers from washing, how we contain that and how we manage that as well.” Peters says western Canadian producers have a keen desire to put out clean stock and they do an excellent job of that. •

— By Harry Siemens