Benchmark Magazine Article Archive

In our current times of high feed prices and increasing expense of inputs, the cost of maintaining the sow herd has risen greatly over the past few years.

It seems to me that one of the few sustainable advantages for North American producers may be the ability to collect useful data, process the data quickly and accurately into information, and immediately execute change to increase efficiencies and performance based on that information.

Sow removal is receiving more attention due to its impact on economic and animal well being considerations. High removal rate of breeding herd females is associated with poor longevity. When the average longevity is low, improvements can be highly profitable (Sehested, 1996). A decreased removal rate of sows reduces the costs for replacement gilts and thereby increases net income.

Hiring the ‘right’ candidate isn’t as easy as advertising a position, reviewing a few resumes, or asking a few questions during an interview. A lot of work, preparation and practice are needed to perfect the art of finding the ‘right’ candidate.

We continue to see significant differences between Canadian and American herds as well as differences in performance by season. As in previous years, Canadian herds are consistently higher in nearly all of the production parameters measured by PigCHAMP, as exhibited in the graphs shown here.

What a difference a year makes! In 2008, the livestock and grain complexes experienced new contract highs for many futures contracts. See the June 2008 CME Lean hog chart (Figure 1) closing at U.S. $100.20/cwt on July 3, 2008. We also experienced the July 2008 Chicago corn futures contract closing at U.S. $8.1575/bu on June 26, 2008.

Sow culling and subsequent replacement rates represent economic opportunities for producers. According to PigCHAMP Annual Summaries, sow culling rates have increased over the last 10 years from median values of 43.6% to 48.7% and averages of 45.5% to 47.0%. Sow culling serves two general purposes.

Here is a simple question: What is the difference between pigs per sow per year and pigs per sow space per year? This is a more complicated question than you might think, but it is an important question, particularly as we look at sow longevity. Sows are removed from the herd due to death, or due to culling under three scenarios:

The pork industry is becoming more interested in the length of time that sows remain productive within commercial operations. The interest in this trait is largely the result of the very tight economic situation that virtually all pork producers are currently experiencing throughout the world. Furthermore, the general public is becoming more concerned with the activities associated with the production of the meat they consume and animal well-being on the operations that produce this food. Furthermore, producers benefit when sows remain productive for a longer period of time in their breeding herds.

Yearly benchmarks serve as “state-of-the-industry” reports that provide both motivation for change and recognition for how far the industry has come. The PigCHAMP annual year-end benchmark, for example, reports average production values as well as the upper and lower 10th percentile values for participating sow farms.

In the literature, benchmarking is viewed as a valuable but often abused business practice. It also takes more work and discipline than we sometimes plan to invest. To review the opportunities and threats of benchmarking, we have enlisted the guidance of the author Anne Evans, whose article, Avoid These Ten Benchmarking Mistakes, can be found at www. swine.farms.com