Better Pork - October 2016

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8 Better Pork October 2016
EMERGENCYPLANNING
comfortable encouraging producers
to use.”
Much of the awareness Jacobs
refers to stems from the outbreak of
the deadly porcine epidemic diar-
rhea (PED) that swept through the
United States, starting in 2013, and
killed more than eight million pigs.
The potential for serious outbreak
in the province alerted the farm-
ing community to the ever-present
dangers lurking around the corner.
(PED did eventually reach a number
of Ontario farms, primarily through
the feed system. The number affected
was small.)
As a result, the OSCIA emergency
plan contains new and updated
sections related to catastrophic
livestock losses as well as health and
safety. The plan also addresses other
major emergency situations such as:
spills management for fuel; manure
and pesticides; power outages; low
water conditions; fire; flowing grain
entrapment; and insufficient manure
storage. Jacobs says, “The last update
to the emergency plan was in the
early 2000s. It was time to update the
whole plan.”
A plan that everybody knows
Although PED never did reach their
farm, just the threat of its outbreak
motivated Tara and Dennis Terps-
tra, owners of the Silver Corners pig
farm in Brussels, to be even more
vigilant in their own emergency
preparedness plans.
“We have always been eager to
engage in the latest measures for
emergency planning, but when the
PED outbreak happened, everyone
involved in farming became aware
of the ever-increasing dangers, and
we were at the front of the line,” says
Tara Terpstra.
If this sounds like 20/20 hindsight
bravado, it isn’t. Although the PED
scare heightened everyone’s aware-
ness to the risks involved, the Terp-
stras give new meaning to the idea
of being prepared for emergencies.
For well over a decade now, Silver
Corners has kept up to date with any
emergency measures available, from
courses and seminars to textbooks
and manuals. If it has something to
do with preparing for the worst, the
Terpstras like to think they’ve done it.
“I don’t think we’re being overly
virtuous or careful here,” says Terp-
stra. “This is our livelihood. This is
how we provide a living for our fam-
ily and our kids, as well as a healthy
food supply to Ontarians. I couldn’t
imagine not constantly learning
about emergency preparedness and
always keeping our plan up to date.
It might be one reason, knock on
wood, that nothing catastrophic has
yet happened on our farm.”
As a sign of just how prepared
the Terpstras are, Tara pulls out
a stack of binders that constitutes
part of their emergency planning
measures. These binders include the
OSCIA emergency plan itself, which
is customizable for individual farms,
as well as learning modules from
courses taken over the years.
Susan Fitzgerald, of Fitzgerald
and Co. in Elmira, is a project man-
ager specializing in the agricultural
and food sector and has plenty of
experience dealing with on-farm
emergency planning and bio-securi-
ty at the local, provincial and federal
levels. About the customizability
of the OSCIA emergency plan, she
says, “Part of its beauty is that it can
absolutely be filled in by any farmer
to suit the needs of his or her specific
farm.”
As an example, Tara Terpstra
points to the section on manure
storage for serving as guidance to
the Silver Corners farm. She says,
“As you go through the various sec-
tions of the plan, you get a sense of
what your own farm’s strengths and
weaknesses are. Luckily, engaging
in this planning helped us learn that
our manure storage capacity is well
above standard and should serve us