Editorial
Door closes, door opens
When Detroit packer Thorn Apple Valley closed its doors last month, it was déjà vu for Ontario pork producers. Another plant closure, joining the ranks of Schneiders, Cold Springs and others who have exited the low-margin, high-volume business of killing live hogs in Ontario.For the "glass half empty" pessimists, here was another nail in the coffin of the pork industry in Ontario, in sharp contrast to booming Western Canada, where packers such as Schneiders and Maple Leaf are opening killing lines. With only two major buyers of live hogs left in the province, how can there be any semblance of true price discovery in Ontario, they lament? And those extra 5,000 to 10,000 hogs a week that TAV was purchasing from Ontario can't do much for prices, especially with U.S. analysts expecting a 40-per cent growth in production over the next 18 months.
Losing a buyer is never good news to the seller. As the recent tragic backup of some 8,000 hogs on Ontario farms showed last month, the big packers are unwilling to step in when there's an overflow situation. Buying in a few extra thousand hogs when you need 30,000 for an extra shift doesn't make good business sense for Maple Leaf Meats boss Michael McCain.
For the "glass half full" optimists, however, the TAV closure could allow the Ontario industry to repatriate some of its hogs. While the biggies may not be interested in 250 potloads, for Ontario's 10 smaller abattoirs (and pig buyers) the TAV closure has a bright silver lining.
Bruce Packers and Weston's Abattoir in Essex county, for instance, are both gearing up production. For them, 5,000 hogs is more likely to be a profit spinner than for McCain or Quality Meats boss David Schwartz.
The industry of late has had almost an obsession with the Pacific Rim. Perhaps the TAV closure is a wakeup call not to lose sight of markets around the corner.
And don't rule out 3-P co-operative, which had been selling to TAV. In a few short years, 3-P has shown what a combination of vision and action can accomplish. They won't roll over now.
Malcolm a driving force
Back in 1993, Canadian live hog exporters were paying almost $25 for the privilege of shipping a single pig to the U.S. Today, the U.S. countervail on Canadian pork exports is history. For that, they have pork industry leaders such as Howard Malcolm to thank.Howard W. Malcolm, 1919-1997, was inducted last month in the Ontario Agricultural Hall of Fame in Milton. The farm boy from Victoria county rose quickly through the ranks of leadership in the Ontario and Canadian pork industries.
Former Ontario pork board chairman Jim Goodhand, who was a rookie director during Malcolm's four-year chairmanship, remembers him as "a great friend, mentor, gentleman and team worker. He was able to organize the pork board and move it ahead as a team."
After 15 years at the Ontario pork board, Malcolm moved on as chairman of the Canadian Pork Council from 1983 to 1987. For three years, he was a member of the SAGIT committee dealing with the North American Free Trade Agreement.
An ardent supporter of free trade, Malcolm travelled the world promoting Canadian pork, working hard to end the U.S. countervailing duty, which would eventually drop to zero in April 1997.
Among many accolades over his career, Malcolm was named Pork Producer of the Year for Durham county, and Honourary Member of the Ontario Institute of Agrologists. He received an award of recognition of service to the Ontario pork industry, and a Centennial Award from the ministry of agriculture and food.
"Howard Malcolm...was a tireless worker and strong advocate of the pork industry across Canada," reads the citation that hangs with Malcolm's portrait in the hall of fame. "He provided the driving force in the development of Ontario pork marketing from small units on mixed farms to modern production units employing some of the world's leading-edge technology."
Separating the boars and girls
New semen screening technology will allow farmers to select by gender as well as geneticsIn as little as three years, pork producers may be able to choose the sex of the animals they produce. An easy-to-use, inexpensive process invented by molecular biology and genetics professor Stan Blecher, University of Guelph, has been licensed to Gensel Biotechnologies Inc., a university spin-off company launched in 1996 to develop and commercialize the invention.
Jeremy Gawen, Gensel's president and CEO, says the worldwide growth of artificial insemination in swine ensures demand for the technology, which is based on screening semen.
The idea has been enthusiastically received by dairy and beef producers. Commercial pig producers would avoid the unwelcome task of castration and "gain $6 or $7 per piglet in quality advantage" with female carcasses compared to barrows, Gawen says.
He says benefits for high feed cost regions like Europe could exceed $20.
"There's no question it would be good if it works," enthuses Jacques Chesnais, general manager, Canadian Centre for Swine Improvement.
Gawen says finding pigs for field trials won't be a problem.
He says it's far too early to discuss pricing: "We're not talking about tens of dollars [per ejaculate]; something in single dollar amounts per ejaculate."
Work on sexing sperm began at the University of Guelph about 12 years ago. While the current focus with swine is on producing gilts, it is well known that boars offer significant carcass quality and feed conversion advantages over gilts and therefore even greater advantages over barrows.
In Canada, virtually all boars are castrated to eliminate the risk of boar taint; the sex odour emitted when meat from some intact males is cooked. For several years Dr. E.J. Squires, a researcher in the Department of Animal and Poultry Science at the University of Guelph, has been studying the causes of boar taint.
He and his associates found the level of boar taint varies by breed and genetic background.
They've identified the major genes responsible and hope to develop a DNA-based screening test that would allow producers to turn out boars that could be marketed intact.
Squires' technology would have to be virtually 100 per cent effective before the industry can take a chance on having even one boar being sold that leads to a consumer swearing off pork, Chesnais believes. If Squires' work does succeed, however, would producers still use Gensel's semen sexing to breed for females? "There would still be an advantage, because you could then select for males," predicts Chesnais.
Gensel is trying to raise money on the Alberta Stock Exchange, where it is listed under the symbol GSB. At press time (June 25) shares were trading at 50 cents.
In May the company was awarded a $450,000 grant by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. - Robert Irwin
Outdoor pigs, indoor numbers
Almost one in two British sows spend their lives outdoors. While it keeps the welfare people happy, outdoor production is less kind on the farmer's pocket book.No longer, says U.K. breeder Cotswold Pig Development, which claims to have developed an outdoor sow with indoor numbers. Cotswold development manager Mike Williamson says one-third of British sow herds are kept outside, versus five per cent 10 years ago. Because outdoor herds tend to be larger, on a pig population basis, 40 per cent of all British sows are now in outside systems, Williamson says.
Traditionally, farmers housing outdoors have had to sacrifice production for cold tolerance. Duroc bloodlines brought hardiness, but there were compromises on leanness and litter size.
After eight years of developing the "composite breeding" technique common in the poultry industry, Cotswold says it has achieved an outdoor sow from two parent lines each containing 25-per cent Duroc genes. The result is a leaner carcass that maintains Duroc hardiness.
Early numbers indicate the new pig, the 5000 Gold X, averages 11.5 pigs born alive and 9.8 reared in outdoor units, says Williamson. With enhanced piglet birth and sow milking ability, litter members can come into the world at 1.5 kg and reach over eight kg at 24-day weaning - at least one kg over the national average liveweight at weaning, and helping reduce days to market by 10, says Cotswold.
No more feed fights
Loose-housed dry sows get high marks from the animal welfare side, but it actually can increase fighting in the barn. A new round sow feeder with dry-wet trickle feeding may help keep the peace."We've introduced a relatively cheap feeding system aimed at avoiding aggression and bullying amongst loose-housed dry sows," says Anders Nielsen, with Danish pig equipment manufacturer Egebjerg Maskinfabrik A/S.
The Biomat feeder has 10 feeding places, each with side flaps, giving a more private feeding area. Also reducing fighting is controlled trickle feeding. Each dispenser can be adjusted to 10 lots of 10 grams over any period, with individual portions adjustable from seven to 15 grams, says Nielsen. Each sow also gets a water nipple.
"We've found that this stops quick eaters rushing to another feeding place the minute they've finished. They know another batch is on its way, and they soon learn to wait for it," says Nielsen. Rationing can be timed to match the slowest eater, he adds.
The Biomat may be enlarged for bigger groups of sows, and the company is now getting requests for similar designs for litters and growers, says Nielsen.
Economic on space, the Biomat fits into a 16 X 18-foot pen for 10 sows, less requirement than an electronic feeder, Nielsen says. Price: C$190 per sow place.
Pig tent pitched
"Outdoor housing" is somewhat of a contradiction, because even outdoor pigs need some shelter. While straw bale structures with plastic roofs are common in Denmark, a Scottish firm has come up with a material for more humid climes.Lorna McIldowie of J.T. Inglis & Sons in Dundee, Scotland, says her company's new Flexi-Shelta pig tents are made of a breathable fabric that keeps out water, but lets in air, cutting down on condensation and humidity and improving pig comfort and performance.
In Scottish Agricultural Colleges tests last winter, finisher pigs in Flexi-Sheltas grew almost 25 per cent faster than the national average, with similar feed conversion efficiency and grading results.
"The tent has provided a substantial, easy-to-operate system for finishing pigs that has produced animals with excellent lung and liver scores, excellent daily liveweight gain and standard feed conversion ratios for the type of pig used," says SAC trials consultant Jamie Robertson.
Price per 160-pig tent is C$3,400, about 60 per cent cheaper than a conventional concrete building, McIldowie estimates.
Freedom to farrow
A new-design British farrowing crate has cut piglet mortality in half, according to its inventors.Developed on the 850-sow Oxfordshire unit of Claire and John Beacroft, the Chiltern Farrowing System features a six-X 10-foot pen with a diagonally-situated crate, one side of which can be detached and swung open to leave the sow free to move around.
On the Beacroft farm, the sows are usually set free within the farrow pens from 48 to 72 hours after birth.
The inventors say piglet deaths drop because piglets have a sheltered creep area and are less likely to be trapped against crate posts by the sow. The sow outside a crate is also usually more careful when getting down.
Price: about C$1,900 per farrowing place.
Scots swear by straw
A little straw in the pig pen helps you go soft on your pigs - and your feed bill - Scottish researchers have found.Birte Nielsen and Colin Morgen of the Scottish Agricultural College's genetics and behavioural sciences department in Edinburgh measured feeding patterns at individual troughs in each pen, and filmed animal behaviour.
They found that pigs with access to straw bedding visited the feed trough more often than their counterparts on bare concrete. Liveweight gain improved by eight per cent, and feed conversion by six per cent.
While this sometimes translated into more aggressive incidents in straw-bedded pens, researchers blamed lower temperatures at the feeder and concluded that overall improved social stability enhanced performance.
European correspondent Norman Dunn is based in Ludwigshafen, Germany
Brit backs against wall
Surging supplies, cheap imports and plunging prices have U.K. pork producers with their backs against the wall.Sir Ross Buckland, chairman of the U.K. food group Unigate, says that pork and pork product prices have fallen 17 per cent so far this year, as Mad Cow fears subside and consumers switch back from pork and poultry to beef and lamb. Downward price pressure also comes from cheap imports from mainland Europe.
British producers complain, however, that they are hamstrung by strict quality assurance schemes their European competitors can ignore. Unigate subsidiary Malton Foods, which now handles one-third of the U.K. slaughter pigs, requires all contracting producers to rear pigs under its own assurance and traceability scheme.
The Malton Bacon Factory, which slaughters more than 40,000 pigs a week, had paid contractors up to C$0.30 per kg carcass weight over the spot market price. But the packer is now making noises about replacing the formula this autumn with a supermarket-approved one. - Stuart Lumb
By John Muggeridge
Find a patty in the barn? Normally nothing to blink at, only those are sows, not cows in there.Cow pie-like stools are one symptom of ileitis, no laughing matter for the estimated one-third of North American pork producers who have been hit by this elusive, profit-robbing disease that can be mistaken for any number of bowel disorders.
Ileitis has been recorded back to the 1930s, but the bacteria that produces it, Lawsonia intracellularis, wasn't discovered until 1991. The cause had previously been believed to be Campylobacter.
The disease also goes by the name porcine proliferative enteropathy, but a much more memorable one is "garden hose gut," an apt description of the thickening of the wall of the lower small intestine, or ileum.
A sure-fire diagnosis is only possible through a post mortem, but visible symptoms in the barn include loose, watery, usually blood-free stools, poor growth, and gaunt, "razor back" pigs with backbone protruding. Symptoms may be confused with swine dysentery, salmonellosis or hemorrhagic bowel syndrome.
A University of Guelph study of post mortems from Ontario herds found that ileitis placed second only to E. coli as the most common swine intestinal disease. The research, funded by Elanco Animal Health in Guelph, found that ileitis was the most common enteric disease in grow-finish pigs, says Elanco research veterinarian Gail Pauling.
Ileitis shows up in all pigs, but the chronic form hits young grower pigs. The bacteria causes rapid cell multiplication in the lower small intestine, and thickening of the gut wall, and reduces the pig's ability to absorb nutrients and water, which are passed out the hind end as diarrhea, along with the bacteria.
Field studies indicate ileitis can decrease average daily gain by up to 35 per cent, and hurt feed conversion by up to 20 per cent. In the breeding herd, however, acute ileitis can kill young gilts and boars in up to six per cent of cases, with the only exterior sign being a black deposit at the rear. A post mortem shows bloody intestines.
Mode of transmission is likely oral-fecal, though Pauling says rats and birds can be ileitis carriers, and humans can transmit it on their boots. There's no indication ileitis is transmissible to humans, and it isn't connected with the human disease by the same name.
While antibiotics such as tetracycline are effective treatments of ileitis, in Canada the only treatment approved for prevention of ileitis is Tylan, a growth-promoting antibiotic from Elanco. Tylan customers currently feed at rates of 11, 22 and 44 ppm for growth promotion. The Tylan rate for ileitis prevention is 110 ppm in the feed for a three-week period prior to the expected onset. There is no withdrawal period.
Company tests show a 22-per cent improvement in average daily gain, and nine per cent in feed conversion. Pauling says Tylan moves into in the pig's gut wall, killing the bacteria, and reducing shedding through manure: "The dollars go into the producer's pocket, not on the pen floor."
Ontario Veterinary College swine veterinarian Bob Friendship says producers can look for more ileitis solutions as more research is done. Friendship says the disease hasn't got a lot of attention because it normally isn't fatal, and shows up mainly in uneven growth. While Tylan is the only on-label recommended treatment, most antibiotics are effective, as the bug is fairly accessible in the pig gut, Friendship says. Good barn washdown is one "excellent" way to control ileitis, he says.