Intensive outdoor pig production systems have been considered in recent years in some
\nparts of the world. These alternatives to traditional slatted-floor indoor systems may become
\nmore common as environmental and\/or animal welfare regulations increase. The objective of this paper is to compare outdoor and indoor pig finishing systems. The results were variable. Some reasons for this variation include differences in pig birth environment, seasonal effects,
\nand quality of ground or bedding surfaces. Research from Texas Tech University indicates that
\noutdoor born pigs have higher growth rates but more backfat. A possible advantage for outdoor
\nrearing may be linked to increased a* values and decreased L* values of the loin muscle. Darker
\ncolored pork is more desirable for export markets because of the increase in water holding
\ncapacity. A careful economic analysis should be conducted to determine if increased backfat and
\nfeed:gain that is associated with outdoor finished pigs could be offset by higher market prices for
\nmeat products from pigs finished in an outdoor environment. Alternative nutrition research
\ncould lead to decreased backfat levels of outdoor finished pigs. If consumers are willing to pay
\nmore for products that are produced as \u201csustainable\u201d, \u201cnatural\u201d, or others, then these production
\nsystems could be very successful in the future. There are some real differences in pork quality noted in the literature. However,
\ndifferences in pork quality vary among the different environments that were investigated.
\nConsumer perception is such that when they enter a retail environment they are willing to buy
\npork products with social assurances. In some cases, consumers may believe the alternative pork
\nproducts will taste better. We can say quite clearly that alternative products do not taste worse
\nthan conventional products. Pork produced from pigs born and reared outdoors was equal to or
\nbetter than pork from conventional systems under some circumstances in our experiences.
\nSuccess of alternative production systems will depend on many factors and consumer
\n\u201cwillingness to pay\u201d for these products would certainly increase economic benefits for these
\nproduction systems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Intensive outdoor pig production systems have been considered in recent years in some parts of the world. These alternatives to traditional slatted-floor indoor systems may become more common as environmental and\/or animal welfare regulations increase. The objective of this paper is to compare outdoor and indoor pig finishing systems. The results were variable. Some reasons […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[8882,2096,949,640,70,10033,13816,4262,1582,2863,12251,2858,6988,189,19644,27280,2851,6904,46,124,171,20007,158,4263,2771,15920,10858,94,10859,1807,14784,79,4264,63,14,1635,33,1324,4732,183,4257,17743,27282,95,1231,14980,20912,1860,20911,4874,7823,6053,1055,69,27281,4265],"class_list":["post-4927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-al","tag-alternative","tag-alternative-housing","tag-animal","tag-animal-welfare","tag-arc","tag-ass","tag-backfat","tag-bedding","tag-birth","tag-born","tag-capacity","tag-color","tag-consumer","tag-dd","tag-environment","tag-fat","tag-fee","tag-feed","tag-finishing","tag-floor","tag-gh","tag-growth","tag-indoor","tag-iron","tag-loin-muscle","tag-mark","tag-meat","tag-nat","tag-natural","tag-ness","tag-nutrition","tag-outdoor","tag-performance","tag-pig","tag-pig-production","tag-pigs","tag-pork","tag-pork-production","tag-pork-quality","tag-prices","tag-prod","tag-production","tag-quality","tag-regulations","tag-search","tag-some","tag-sustainable","tag-t","tag-tan","tag-taste","tag-use","tag-variation","tag-water","tag-welfare","tag-willingness-to-pay"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4927\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}