Don’t do it for free, urged Bill Hollis, DVM, president of Professional Swine Management, during the 2022 Carthage Swine Conference in Quincy, Ill.
Hollis kicked off a session on Proposition 12, providing an overview of what’s happened and what’s ahead. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Proposition 12 on Oct. 11.
“Even if the U.S. Supreme Court says you can’t regulate it, my opinion is there is still going to be this demand that’s created for a product that’s already understood. It may not be the entire state of California, but there are people out there selling and building relationships to provide it,” Hollis said.
Although it’s not going to be all the product, he says it is a product that’s going to be well represented, negotiated and delivered.
“My advice is don’t do it for free,” Hollis said. “If you don’t own the packing plant, you have to get very close with the packing plant to know where you would fit. We’ve done some economics on this and say it’s somewhere in this $15 or $7.50 a hundredweight that we think that you should be trying to recapture.”
From a PSM standpoint, they weren’t able to get any of their managed sow farms with multiple packer relationships to make that commitment, Hollis added.
“We manage for a lot of independent producers that come together in a commercial form,” he said. “And there are several of them that were considering it, but it was just really hard to make if they don’t own the packing plant as there’s a considerable amount of risk.”
CDFA Rule Update
Liz Cox, DVM, oversees the Animal Care Program within California Department of Food and Ag (CDFA) that’s in charge of implementing and enforcing Proposition 12. Her team is tasked with implementing and enforcing Proposition 12, including adoption of regulations, egg compliance, at-risk investigations and outreach and education.
They are also actively visiting farms in California and out of the state. In addition to helping people understand Proposition 12, she said her team is learning a lot as well about the industry they need to regulate.
Prop 12 is a ballot initiative passed by California voters in 2018 with a 63% yes vote. It applies to covered animals raised in California and covered products from these animals sold in California. For pork, that also includes meat from immediate offspring of breeding pigs.
One of the big questions Cox has had to interpret is what is a breeding pig? The statute defines breeding pig as a female pig kept for commercial breeding who is six months older or pregnant.
One of the areas that needed more definition is production cycle, Cox said.
“We’ve added this ‘production cycle’ definition in the proposed regulations of production cycle. It helps guide producers as they’re thinking, “Do I want to make facility adjustments? Do I want to make a commitment to Prop 12?’ She has to be in the Prop 12 compliant housing for her production cycle,” Cox explained during the Carthage Swine Conference.
In the regulations that have not been approved yet, production cycle means the lifecycle of a commercial breeding pig for the generation of immediate offspring. A production cycle for gilts begins when they are six months or older and moved into an enclosure for breeding and ends when a litter of piglets is weaned. Meanwhile, a new production cycle for sows begins when each litter of piglets is weaned.
“It’s our interpretation of the law, which is reflected in the proposed regulations, that it’s really when she’s first inseminated, first breeding of the gilt that she needs to be under Prop 12 compliancy,” she added.
Prop 12 does not say that animals need to be housed in groups, Cox pointed out. It’s one way to manage Prop 12, to meet the standard of the need to be able to turn around freely which is defined in the law as turning a complete circle without any impediment including a tether and without touching the sides of an enclosure or another animal.
“If we’re thinking about a big sow and she needs at least 24 square feet of usable floor space, and she needs to turn around freely, I can understand we’re going to manage in groups as far as meeting both of those expectations. But it is not written in the law that they must be housed in groups,” she said. “When thinking about any sort of modification or construction, you need to meet both of these standards. Whether she’s alone or she’s in a group, she must be able to turn around freely somewhere within that enclosure. It’s not just a length by width of 24 sq. ft., you must provide the space for her to turn around.”
The exceptions to confinement are gilts prior to the first breeding, farrowing and while nursing piglets and 6 hours/day and no more than 24 hours/30-day period (most likely to be used for breeding).
“Right now, everything written on our website as far as regulations is all proposed, and it’s not a requirement until it becomes law and is signed off by the Office of Administrative Law. We’re patiently waiting for them to tell us what to do next,” Cox said.
One producer asked Cox if producers needed to be registered with CDFA.
“The way it’s proposed currently, and the way we’re envisioning it would be so again, is that the sale in California needs to be legal. What we have proposed is that the distributors selling product in California need to be registered. We have not proposed that the producer would need to register unless the producer is directly selling product to a consumer in California,” she answered.
More from Farm Journal’s POORK:
Why Agriculture Can’t Ignore Proposition 12 and Question 3
Biden Administration Backs NPPC, Farm Bureau in Prop 12 Supreme Court Case
Iowa Supreme Court Brings Back Pig Farmers’ Right to Farm
