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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:
Finding New Technologies in the Pork Industry: Towards Precision Farming or Just High-Tech Hype?
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Production by student on June 29, 2018
Author: Lee Whittington
Reference: Banff Pork Seminar Proceeding 2018
Summary:
Precision farming is a term that is used to describe agricultural production that utilizes the collection of data in the field and use of expensive inputs to improve net income, reduce waste and impact on the environment, and speed decisions. Technology advancements are largely based on lower-cost data collection devices.
Some of these technologies begin outside of the barn. Such examples are Geofencing and syndromic health surveillance. These technologies utilize satellite technology which draws a fence around the facility to aid in tracking movement. This technology serves as a viable addition for biosecurity protocols. The advantage of utilizing this platform is that it has the ability to create a network for users which can communicate health status. For this technology there is a yearly subscription cost of $300.
Although transportation is necessary, it also posses a substantial risk to on farm biosecurity. Of recent development is technology that aids in instant detection with regards to the hygienic standing of the trailer. Of these technologies is ATP meter swabs. These swabs give an instantaneous read out of “clean” or “dirty” without the downtime that culture swabs require. DrySist is another technology developed by Castene Trailer manufacturing in Spain.Lastly, with regards to trailers is traceability. Recent technology inserts a GPS chip that allows the vehicle to be tracked.
Technology that aids production within the barn includes recordkeeping services such as PigChamp Pro Europa, costing $6 USD per 20kg weaned pig produced. There is also a commercially available digital pen which allows a pen and paper solution to expensive digital phones. Vetic, developed in Spain, will provide complete traceability of injectibles, by linking pig/pen/room through RFID tags.
Finding New Technologies in the Pork Industry