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Industry Partners
Prairie Swine Centre is an affiliate of the University of Saskatchewan
Prairie Swine Centre is grateful for the assistance of the George Morris Centre in developing the economics portion of Pork Insight.
Financial support for the Enterprise Model Project and Pork Insight has been provided by:
Sampling Procedures for Piggery Slurry in Deep Pits for Estimation of Nutrient Content
Posted in: Environment by admin on January 1, 2003 | No Comments
Pilot Implementation Study for Environmental Management System Standard Concludes
Posted in: Environment by admin on | No Comments
A pilot implementation study designed to help fine tune a proposed environmental management system standard for Canadian hog operations has been completed and is now under review. The Canadian Pork Council (CPC) completed an initial study that analyzed the strengths and weaknesses associated with developing, adopting or adapting and environmental management system-based program. They developed a standard in draft form that outlines requirements in areas such as policy, planning, implementation, checking and corrective action. They should also identify their adverse environmental impacts and develop plans reduce and manage them to comply with the standard.
The pilot study has 12 hog operations attempting to implement the draft standard that was created. These operations had to determine what regulations they have to adhere to in operating their farms on a daily basis, identify the activities that occur within their operations that might have an adverse impact on the environment and put together a plan to mitigate those adverse effects. Third party auditors then went out to these operations to assess the standard’s affordability, operational feasibility, and auditability. The goal is to have the standard be as realistic and user-friendly as possible and to improve the standard before final release to the marketplace.
The benefits that could be realized from the environmental management system standards includes 1) the reduction of operator’s adverse impacts of the environment; 2) the improvement of operator’s efficiency through reduced resource use and waste generation; and 3) the improvement of the operator’s market access and competitiveness by promoting environmentally friendly products.
Simulation and Validation of the Evaporation of Water from Liquid Manure using Ventilation Exhaust Air: linking of two Simulation Models
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The pig production needs to be modified into a sustainable system. Handling of the manure and reducing
emissions have to be taken into account in the design of pig facilities, so the called integrated pig facilities are being developed in which the energy in the exhaust air can be used to evaporate water fromliquid manure. The objective of this research was to link an existing dynamic simulation model for indoor climate calculation to a newly developed simulation model for manure evaporation, allowing annualised calculation of evaporation. The physical processes that occur in the liquid manure evaporator were described in a dynamic simulation model. This model was validated with experiments carried out in a laboratory facility. This model underestimated the evaporation with an average of 154%. Some explanations were given. Model calculation of the evaporation at annual basis shows that per fattening pig place 038 to 041m3 liquid manure per year can be evaporated. To increase the evaporation level, thermal energy can be added. The linking of two simulation models was successful. The liquid manure drying simulation model can be used to gain insight in the possibilities of using a manure drying technique under a variety of circumstances, and to design practical installations and to optimise the drying process.
Literature review: the physical properties of compost
Posted in: Environment by admin on | No Comments
Estimating Ammonia Volatilization from Swine-Effluent Droplets in Sprinkle Irrigation
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TopCross High Oil Corn Production: Select Grain Quality Attributes
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Top 10 cost cutters and revenue generators
Posted in: Prairie Swine Centre by admin on | No Comments
Many producers may already be implementing changes and new ideas to lower costs and increase revenues. In many cases, this is the key to success in maintaining an operational pork production system. This article looks at 13 ideas focused on changes that can be implemented and monitored easily and inexpensively. For example, ideal feed formulation is dependant on animal weight and performance, as well as the cost of ingredients. If diets have not been updated recently, ingredient prices will likely have changed and may be costing the producer more than is required. Effects of these changes have been calculated in terms of dollars/pig marketed.
Variation in pig performance: Can we do anything about it?
Posted in: Prairie Swine Centre by admin on | No Comments
Variation in the hog barn is becoming an increasing topic of interest in the pork industry. Variation within the barn is a cost to the producer as it reduces barn utilization and causes a loss of revenue market. Variation can be the result of many causes, but most often fits into the categories of genetics or environment. Birth weights, weaning weight, litter of origin, gender and the parity of the dam all genetically affect the individual pig. Ideally, negative environmental impacts would all be eliminated. However, this is not usually the case. The producers goal should be to minimize negative environmental impacts by ensuring access to resources such as feed and water and minimizing exposure to pathogens. Statistically, variation can be defined in many ways. Most commonly, variation is measured as the standard deviation or coefficient of variation. The more dispersed the weights of the pigs, the larger the standard deviation. Certain management practises can be employed to reduce variation; however, this depends on the existing coefficient of variation. One suggestion to manage variation is to house barrows and gilts separately since barrows tend to eat more feed than gilts and reach market weight 5-7 days sooner.