Pork industry day covers hot topics

This is the encouraging message that Cooperative Research Centre for High Integrity Australian Pork CEO Roger Campbell will deliver in his opening address at the SA Pig Industry Day on February 26.

“Indeed, our own Pork CRC benchmarking results also suggest the best Australian producers are a force to be reckoned with and are willing to share their recipes for success to the industry in general,” Dr Campbell added.

While admitting it was difficult to match USA and Canada on cost, due to their relatively low cost grain and heavier carcases, which resulted in low feed and overhead costs per unit of pork produced, he said Australia’s pork industry was in a good position and had the capacity to further improve its financial and physical business indicators.

“Although, the Danes and Dutch lead the world in the number of pigs weaned per sow per year (29-30) due to the large numbers of pigs born per litter, several Pork CRC benchmarking participants are matching or getting close to these figures without the extreme litter sizes reported by the Danes and Dutch,” he said.

“Our producers are demonstrating there are many ways to enhance the number of pigs weaned per sow per year and are certainly making the most from the sows they have.

“I congratulate them for their on-farm ingenuity and for adopting much of the world class R&D that’s emerged from Pork CRC via our research partners.”

One such innovator, leading Vic pork producer Tom Smith, will outline the practical changes he and his sons have made to optimise breeding herd performance.

Pork CRC Manager – commercialisation and research impact Charles Rikard-Bell will also deliver an address, titled ‘Making your feed grain work harder for you before you buy or use it, with AusScan’.

Pork CRC research developed AusScan the world’s first in-vivo energy values for cereal grains and reactive lysine values for ‘heat damaged’ canola and soybean meal using near infrared spectroscopy.

Pork CRC has a business agreement with UK company Aunir, which now makes AusScan NIRS calibrations available on-line.

According to Dr Rikard-Bell, Australian pork producers, feedmills and laboratories are increasingly embracing the initiative and connecting to AusScan Online.

“Using near infrared spectroscopy to scan grains and upload spectra files to AusScan Online allows rapid determination of in vivo energy values of the grain and hence how pigs will perform – before producers buy the grain,” he said.

“Likewise, producers can access AusScan Online to determine the reactive lysine values for heat damaged canola and soybean meal.”