Pork producers are continually looking for areas in which they can gain a competitive advantage. One of these areas is through early adoption of research results. The possibility of lowering production costs and increasing revenues through successful implementation and use of new technologies is of great interest in the pork industry. However, the financial risks and rewards perceived may limit the extent of technological adoption. Prairie Swine Centre together with George Morris Centre have developed an analytical tool to help provide more detail on the economic impact of research results. This model can simulate the economic impact by applying Prairie Swine Centre research results to various sizes of commercial farms. This information allows the producer to assess current technologies that would best fit their operation.
Estimating economic impact on an operation is very important when implementing new technologies. Twenty-two Prairie Swine Centre experiments between 1999-2004 were selected for a detailed financial analysis in order to value the economic impact of research on the pork industry. These experiments were then prioritized in terms of net benefit per hog marketed and ease of adoption. It was found that the specific research projects selected between 1999-2004 generated net benefits to producers of $0.11-$8.84 per hog marketed. Of these projects analyzed, 25% generated at least $2.00/hog marketed and another 25% generated more than $1.00/hog marketed. Overall, the main objective was to assist pork producers in identifying ways to minimize costs and maximize revenues by 1) identifying technologies, 2) prioritizing actions in terms of ease of application and 3) implementing them in a strategic manner.
Ease of adoption of experiments was divided into categories of Easy, Moderate and Difficult. It was estimated that 80% of the Easy category experiments were adopted by pork industry producers, 40% of the Moderate level experiments and 10% of the category deemed Difficult. Annual benefit to the pork industry is $160 million with two thirds generated from adopted Easy and Moderate categories of projects. Research pays big dividends! The continued provision of applied near market research done at Prairie Swine Centre benefit both pork producers and the industry. Even if not all producers are able to implement all research results they would still realize a significant improvement to their bottom line through incorporation of any number of research results. If 10% of the benefit was adopted it would improve net return over $3.00/hog marketed.