Alberta Pork Congress
The 44th annual Alberta Pork Congress will be held in Westerner Park in Red Deer June 13th & 14th.
Trade Show hours: Wednesday June 13th 9 am – 4:30 pm, Thursday June 14th 9am – 4pm.
Wednesday June 13th – Awards Banquet Reception at 5:30pm, Awards Banquet Dinner & Awards 6:30 pm. This year new location Holiday Inn & Suites on Gasoline Alley. Some tickets may still be available check with the registration desk.
Thursday June 14th – Almost Famous BBQ on site at Western Park 4pm – 6 pm.
For any details or information check on the website albertaporkcongress.com or contact the office at 403.244.7821 or email kate@albertaporkcongress.com or kimberly@albertaporkcongress.com •
Porkapalooza
The 5th annual Porkapalooza BBQ Festival will once again be hosted and organized by Alberta Pork. Located at Northlands Park in Edmonton June 16th & 17th.
The Porkapalooza BBQ Festival is a community event showcasing the art and culture of BBQ. It is organized by the Porkapalooza BBQ Festival Society with generous financial support from Alberta Pork and other sponsors. At its heart, it is a BBQ competition, but it encompasses all the components of a festival: local food trucks, beer gardens, food demonstration stage, a Kids Zone playground and plenty of entertainment.
The BBQ Festival is officially full with 50 teams registered The BBQ festival charity society in the past has supported local charites Ronald Mcdonald’s House, Youth Empowerment & Support Services and AdaptAbilities. Check out their website for more details porkapalooza.ca for more details. •
Ontario Pork Congress
The annual Ontario Pork Congress will be held in Stratford June 20th & 21st. Details available on their website at porkcongress.on.ca •
Alberta Livestock Expo
The date the 2nd annual Alberta Livestock Expo will take place in Lethbridge at Exhibition Park October 10th & 11th.
This year the trade show has expanded to two days. In addition on Wednesday October 10th there will be a Beef Rib BBQ Competitor. Then on Thursday October 11th a Hog Carcass Competition.
Bookings have begun for the 2 day show in October, book before July 14th to ensure the early bird booking price.
Full details are available on the website albertalivestockexpo.com or by contacting Lisa Doyle Exhibition Manager at 403.305.1563 or at lisa@vibrabteventmanagement.ca •
Red Deer Swine Technology Workshop
The annual Red Deer Swine Technology Workshop will be held in Red Deer Wednesday October 24th at a NEW location in the Parkland Pavillion at Westerner Park.
Plans are well underway for speakers and initial agenda. A few highlights include: Risk Management & Contract Forwarding, Loose Sow Housing – Pro’s & Cons, Farm Safety, Understanding Boars and Semen Quality and Audit Results just to name a few.
Registration will open soon in the mean time should you have any questions or comments please feel free to contact Sara Parton at 780.491.3525 or sara.parton@albertapork.com . •
Aherne Awards
Do you know of an innovator who should be recognized? Someone who has developed an original solution to answer a pork production challenge? Or found a creative use of a known technology?
The Banff Pork Seminar is proud to offer a chance for you to “strut your stuff” as a technology innovator and show the rest of us how to put it into practice!
The Dr. FX Aherne Prize for Innovative Pork Production recognizes innovators involved in the pork industry who are making a difference by applying new technologies or management techniques.
Innovators can win valuable prizes and free registration to the 2019 Banff Pork Seminar, January 8-10; you’ll be recognized by your peers and the pork industry and have a chance to present your solution at the 2018 Banff Pork Seminar. Please nominate yourself, or apply on behalf of an innovator that deserves to be recognized. Help us to find these innovators and encourage them to apply for the Dr. FX Aherne Prize for Innovative Pork Production.
Specifically, we are looking for innovators who are capable of taking a new research concept, a technology, or even a management concept and apply it successfully in the production of pork. Innovations may be related to, but are not limited to, one of the following areas: Productivity, Profitability, Working Conditions, Animal Well Being, Reduced Environmental Impact, Pork Quality and Safety.
Anyone who has developed a solution to a pork production challenge may enter. Innovations must be relevant to North American pork production but do not necessarily have to be currently in use in Canada at the time of application. Application and more information will be available online at www.banffpork.ca.
Applications must be received by October 31, 2018. Apply today! Please contact Conference Coordinator Ashely Steele at pork@ualberta.ca with questions. •
Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium
The annual Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium will take place November 14 & 15 at the Saskatoon Inn. The Prairie Hog Country August release will have all the details on program and registration.•
Prairie Livestock Expo
Mark your calendars for Prairie Livestock Expo, which will be held at the Victoria Inn and Conference Centre Wednesday December 12th in Winnipeg. Details and exhibitor packages will be available in months to come. •
Banff Pork Seminar
Banff Pork Seminar will take place at the Banff Springs Hotel January 8 – 10th , 2019. The committee is already working hard on planning the next instalment at the Castle in the Rockies. Watch for future issues for further information. Online registration will start in September. For more information contact Ashley Steeple, Conference Coordinator, PH: 780.492.3651 or Email: pork@ualberta.ca •
Cramer Ag Expo
Keep Thursday February 21st open for the annual Cramer Expo in Swift Current, SK.•
PED Virus Hits Manitoba Farm
Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus has broken out on a farm in southeastern Manitoba. It’s the third year in a row that there has been a PED virus outbreak in that area in May or June. Hog farmers have been put on high alert, especially in an area bounded by highways 75, 12 and 52 to the Red River and Provincial Road 210. •
— By Jim Romahn
Flies Can Spread PED
New research indicates flies can spread Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus. It might also explain why there are more outbreaks during cold weather when hog operations are less likely to practice fly control. But the virus is also known to survive longer in cool conditions. Even a few flies have the ability to infect pigs with PED virus, says veterinarian Grant Allison at the Walcott, Iowa, Veterinary Clinic. Flies captured on swine operations amid outbreaks of PED virus and Senecavirus A, tested positive as carriers of the viruses in Iowa and Minnesota studies. In the case of Senecavirus A as well as PED virus, flies transmitted live virus—the first known such findings in a commercial setting. Flies multiply in wet manure “so there’s an intimate relationship between manure and virus and flies,” Allison said. “ •
— By Jim Romahn
Teresa Van Raay Ends CPC Term
Teresa Van Raay has completed her term as a director at the Canadian Pork Council. She remains in national pork politics as a director of Canada Pork International. She gained both positions from her role as a director of the Ontario Pork marketing board. •
— By Jim Romahn
Pig Virus May Jump to People
Researchers have shown in lab experiments that a virus recently discovered in pigs can jump to humans.
But what they don’t know is whether it can make that jump outside of lab conditions and, if it does, what it means for human health.
The worrisome part is that this virus is similar to SARS which touched off a panic when it spread to Toronto and other places around the world.
The virus in question is porcine deltacoronavirus and the recent research was performed at The Ohio State University and Utrecht University in the Netherlands. And published online in the journal PNAS.
Porcine deltacoronavirus was first identified in 2012 in pigs in China, but it was not associated with clinical disease. It was first detected in the United States in 2014 during a diarrhea outbreak in Ohio pigs, and has since been detected in various countries.
Young, infected pigs can experience acute diarrhea and vomiting; and the disease can be fatal. As of yet, no human cases have been documented, but scientists are concerned about the possibility.
“Before it was found in pigs – including in the Ohio outbreak – it had only been found in various birds,” said study senior author Linda Saif, an investigator in Ohio State’s Food Animal Health Research Program at the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center (OARDC), in Wooster.
“We’re very concerned about emerging coronaviruses and worry about the harm they can do to animals and their potential to jump to humans,” said Saif, a distinguished university professor of veterinary preventive medicine. Emergence of the virus is especially worrisome to veterinary and public-health experts because of its similarity to the life-threating viruses responsible for SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) outbreaks. •
— By Jim Romahn
China Houses Pigs in High-rises
More “high-rise hog hotels” are going up on Yaji Mountain in southern China, as the country rapidly modernizes and expands its hog industry. One building will have as many as 13 floors—the world’s tallest building of its kind.
“There are big advantages to a high-rise building,” said Xu Jiajing, manager of Yangxiang’s mountain-top farm, according to Reuters.
“It saves energy and resources. The land area is not that much but you can raise a lot of pigs.”
However, building up costs more for feeding, ventilation, manure management and using elevators to move pigs.
And recently China’s hog producers have pulled back on their aggressive expansion plans because profits are being squeezed by lower hog prices and higher feed costs, some of that because of a new tariff on U.S. soybeans.
Farm manager Xu said Yangxiang reduces the risk of disease by managing each floor separately, with staff working on the same floor every day.
New sows are introduced to a building on the top floor and are then moved by elevator to an assigned level where they remain.
The ventilation system is designed to prevent air from circulating between floors, instead coming from the ground channels to ducts on each floor. A central exhaust is on the roof with extraction fans pulling air through filters. A waste treatment plant is still under construction to handle the site’s manure. After treatment, the liquid will be sprayed on the surrounding forest and solids will be sold to farms as organic fertilizer. Yangxiang will house 30,000 sows in this 11-hectare (27-acre) site by year-end, producing 840,000 piglets per year.
The company has spent nearly 16,000 yuan ($2,524 US) per sow on the new farm, about 500 million yuan ($79 million US), not including the cost of the pigs.
Locating the farms on a mountain has challenges, but the site is close to Guigang, a city with a river port and waterway connections to the Pearl River Delta, one of the world’s most densely populated regions.
In Fujian province, Shenzhen Jinxinnong Technology Co. Ltd. also plans to invest 150 million yuan ($24 millionUS) in two five-story sow farms in Nanping. Two other companies are building high-rise hog farms in Fujian as well, according to an equipment firm involved in the projects.
Thai livestock-to-retail conglomerate CP Foods is also building four six-story pig units with local firm Zhejiang Huatong Meat Products Co. in Yiwu, a Chinese city near the large populations around Shanghai.
China’s 10 largest pig farming firms accounted for only 5.8 per cent of hogs sent to slaughter in 2016, but that was up by 2.8 per cent from the previous year, said Zhang Guangan, director of the China Swine Industry Association. •
— By Jim Romahn
China, U.S. Reach Trade Truce
China and the United States have reached a trade truce agreement that President Donald Trump says it good news for farmers. He said they can produce as much as they want now that China has lifted its trade restrictions on pork and soybeans. That is not only good news for U.S. farmers, but also Canadians because prices for both countries move together. However, it also means that Chinese buyers will no longer be quite so keen about buying Canadian pork and soybeans to fill the gap when they weren’t buying from the U.S. •
— By Jim Romahn
Changes to Federal Livestock Traceability Requirements on the Horizon
Livestock traceability is built on three foundational pillars: (1) identification of locations [i.e., Premises ID]; (2) animal identification; and (3) reporting movements of animals from one location to another. Pigs are the only species group that currently fulfills all three pillars at a national level through the PigTRACE Canada program, which has been mandatory under federal regulations since July 1, 2014.
Those same regulations (Part XV of the federal Health of Animals Regulations) are edging closer to requiring all three traceability pillars for bison, cattle, farmed deer, goats and sheep. Some of those species have had long-standing requirements for animal identification. Movement reporting requirements will be new additions to those sectors.
Consultations between livestock groups and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) in 2013 and again in 2015 have attempted to outline the design of the requirements. CFIA has summarized the feedback and worked internally within the Canadian government to draft proposed regulatory changes for a public comment period of 75 days. The proposed regulatory changes will be available in Canada Gazette 1, perhaps as early as June 2018.
Major changes to requirements for pigs are not being proposed; however, this is a window of opportunity for Manitoba Pork and the Canadian Pork Council (CPC) to push for changes to pig requirements in response to pork industry recommendations for improvement.
For more information, contact Jeff Clark, Director, PigTRACE Canada, at clark@cpc-ccp.com, toll-free at 1.866.300.1825 or directly at 1.204.235.4440. •
American Farmers Worried About Outlook
There is a decided downturn in expectations among United States farmers according to the results of the most recent monthly survey by the Purdue Centre for Commercial Agriculture The trade wars triggered by President Donald Trump are responsible for the anxious mood.
The April barometer reading of 125 was 10 points lower than a month earlier and 15 points below the February reading. The barometer is based on a monthly survey of 400 agricultural producers from across the country.
ames Mintert, the barometer’s principal investigator and director of Purdue University’s Center for Commercial Agriculture, said “negative perceptions about exports spill over into lower expectations for commodity prices, and then that changes producers’ views about farmland prices.”
The trade dispute with China has farmers worried about soybean exports, 30 percent of which go to China.
A majority of producers said they expect a sharp decline in the November soybean futures contract price, possibly to below breakeven.
The April survey also showed a decline in the number of producers expecting good times for the livestock sector, with just 45 percent saying they felt optimistic about the future compared to 59 percent a month earlier. This is the largest one-month drop since data collection began in fall 2015.
“There was already a sharp drop in hog prices that took place from mid- to late- winter, then add to that the impact of China’s 25 percent tariff on U.S. pork imports,” Mintert said. “It adds a layer of doubt regarding the profitability of pork production and appears to be affecting producers’ plans to increase hog production.”
The problem for Canadians is that U.S. prices drive the North American market. Trump has promised subsidies to cover U.S. trade-related price declines, but that’s no help for Canadians. •
— By Jim Romahn
Managing Feeding to Reduce Feed Wastage in Lactation
Electronic feeding systems have multiple advantages over manual feed delivery including collection of feed intake data, controlled delivery of fresh feed, reduced feed wastage, and lower labour costs. However, these feed systems can be costly to install and maintain.A simple feeding system was developed to reduce this cost consisting of a feed drop tube that extends to approximately one inch above the base of the feeder, which required the sow to manipulate the tube to release small quantities of feed.
A total of 45 sows and litters were randomly assigned to one of three feeding systems – manual feeding, a commercially available electronic sow feeder, or the modified system.
The type of feeding system used had no effect on sow body weight, body condition score, or back fat. Sow feed intake was significantly higher with manual feeding when compared to the other two feeding systems in the first two weeks of lactation, no difference was evident in the third week.
It was found that manual feeding of sows during lactation can result in higher feed usage with no corresponding increase in sow or litter productivity. At today’s feed prices, the reduction in feed intake associated with the electronic or modified feeding system would save producers an estimated $8.50 per lactation when compared to manual feeding. Therefore, the electronic and modified feeding systems should be considered to minimize feed wastage and maximize returns. •
— Prairie Swine Centre
Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP)
The CPTPP was signed on March 8 at a ceremony in Santiago, Chile that was attended by International Trade Minister François-Philippe Champagne and the 10 other trade ministers from the CPTPP countries. CAFTA and some of its members were there to witness the signing of the deal.
CAFTA applauded the Government of Canada for signing the final text, which represents positive progress towards the ratification of the deal. CAFTA urges Canada to be in the first wave of countries to ratify the agreement in order to take full advantage of the initial tariff cuts.
In a statement issued following the signing, CAFTA President Brian Innes stated, “Having preferential access for the first time to Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore will fire up the agri-food sector’s engine and move us toward the government’s ambitious target of $75 billion in agri-food exports by 2025.” The agreement will mean more stability and prosperity for Canada and now the Canadian government must move forward and make it happen. •
Did you Know ?
The pork industry is the 4th largest farming industry in Canada and contributes to the sound economy and prosperity of the country, creates jobs in rural and urban areas and provides abundant supplies of locally produced, affordable, high-quality protein for Canadians and millions of people around the world. Canadian hog producers are committed to following the highest standards in order to care for animals and protect the land and the environment.
The Canadian Pork Council works hard with Canadian hog producers to maintain Economic Sustainability
There are more than 7,000 pig farms across Canada producing more than 25.5 million animals a year. With direct farm gate annual sales at $4.1 billion, the pork sector is the fourth-largest source of farm cash receipts of any Canadian agricultural commodity. The industry supports 31,000 farm jobs which, in turn, contribute to 103,000 direct, indirect and inducted jobs across the country. The total economic activity or output of these jobs generates $23.8 billion when farms, inputs, processing and pork exports are included. (Source CPC 15/16 Annual Report)
In addition and just as important are both Social Responsibility and Sustainability focusing on three areas: Animal Care, Antimicrobials Stewardship and Environmental Sustainability.
Animal care is a key consideration for Canadian pork producers. This requires adopting the high standards set by the industry and government agencies. Producers conduct a welfare assessment for their farm that can then be used to monitor, manage and document on-farm animal care practices. Canadian producers follow the National Farm Animal Care Council’s Code of practice for the Care and Handling of Pigs.
Producers understand that prudent use of antimicrobials is key to mitigate the development of antimicrobial resistance. In their commitment to a responsible use of antimicrobials, producers are supporting Health Canada’s regulatory changes to strengthen oversight of veterinary drugs.
The CPC’s Drug Use Policy provides pork producers with the tools for a judicious use of antimicrobials on their animals, ensuring a safe food supply. For example, pigs that have received antibiotics will not be sent to slaughter before all traces of the medicine is out of their system.
Canadian pork producers are stewards of the land. This involves preserving ecosystems and resources, such as soil and water as well as minimizing the environmental impacts of their activities through the implementation of beneficial agricultural practices. •
40 Million Pigs in Topigs Norsvin’s Breeding Database Pigbase
Pigbase, Topigs Norsvin’s breeding database, now contains data from more than 40 million breeding pigs. Pigbase contains pig data gathered at nucleus farms, commercial farms, and slaughterhouses. It also contains genomic data and data gathered from cut-out sessions, CT scans and other innovative measuring protocols used in our breeding program and research.
The 40 millionth pig in Pigbase is a piglet born mid-March at Calvern Farms, a Topigs Norsvin nucleus farm in Canada. Calvern Farms breeds TN Tempo sire line and is part of the new breeding infrastructure being built up in Manitoba, Canada. The centerpiece of this is the new central testing station Delta Canada that will become operational this summer and will test TN Tempo and Z-line dam lines.
Pigbase links the Topigs Norsvin breeding farms with each other, thus creating a single large population of breeding pigs. Worldwide a total of more than 1000 breeding farms in over 40 countries are included in Pigbase. This makes it possible to achieve high genetic progress and to rapidly disseminate this around the world to our customers. •
Maple Leaf Foods Revamps Recipes
Maple Leaf Foods says it is embarking on an historical revamping of its recipes for processed meats.
There will no longer be any artificial flavours, colourings or sweeteners and there will be an emphasis on “pure and simple”ingredients, said president and chief executive officer Michael McCain.
There will be “a comprehensive revamp of the entire portfolio so that all products are made with Maple Leaf’s premium meat and real, simple, or natural ingredients.” the company said in a news release today.
“ All products will contain NO artificial preservatives, flavours, colours or sweeteners. The brand will lead in transparency, including legible, pronounceable ingredients that consumers trust and can find in their pantry,” the company said..
McCain said “consumer expectations are changing, and we are rising to the challenge.”
“Over the last 18 months, Maple Leaf has reformulated each product carrying this brand, with just the simplest and highest quality real food,” said Adam Grogan, senior vice president, marketing and innovation. “We have taken out the things people don’t want or don’t know, and have only included ingredients that deliver our highest standard of quality and delicious taste.
“ The result is a breakthrough of innovation in meat products that consumers love to eat. They can feel good about their real food choices and can trust the brand through our commitment of absolute transparency.”
The company is branding the revamped products with a red maple leaf placed over the company name. •
— By Jim Romahn
