Behind the Lines - June 2014

Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Mike and Amy Cronin may very well be the first Ontario producers to experience porcine epidemic diarrhea. The virus hit their operation in the United States a month before the first case was found on a farm in this province. The Cronins' efforts to keep the disease out of their farm in Ontario and the efforts of others to enhance their biosecurity are detailed in this issue's cover story. The legacy of PED may very well be the enhancement of biosecurity in swine operations across the province. Field editor Mary Baxter's story starts on page 6.

"It's the lunatics that continue to run the asylum," is the way one veteran bankruptcy trustee described the kind of situation seen at Quality Meat Packers, following its application for bankruptcy protection in early April.

Starting on page 16, freelance writer Jim Algie outlines the demise of Quality Meats and the lessons learned from it. The sudden demise of the oldest plant in Ontario caught the industry off guard, but perhaps it shouldn't have. With federal plants operating at far less than capacity, something had to give, and it was Quality's suppliers who were caught out. A financial protection plan may be the solution to prevent such losses in the future, but no one has answers. Any plan that is under consideration will have to match the complex situation in Ontario where producers supply plants under contracts or sell pigs to a packer that they own themselves.

In the cover story in the April issue of Better Pork, Ken Verkuyl, of Verkuyl Farms Limited at Woodstock, was incorrectly identified. We apologize for the error and any embarrassment this may have caused.

With summer coming on, swine producers will have heat stress on their minds; they know it has a significant impact on returns in the industry. Swine nutritionist Janice Murphy outlines new research that indicates blood insulin levels in pigs that have decreased feed intake likely results in gains in fat instead of muscle. BP

ROBERT IRWIN