Production Analysis Summary for U.S. Pork: Use the Data to Your Advantage
“You don't know what you don't know if you're not tracking it and if you're not monitoring it,” says Brad Eckberg, business analyst at MetaFarms, Inc.
The Production Analysis Summary for the U.S. Pork Industry represents data from the past five years (2017 to 2021). The 2021 dataset represents 1,420,762 females from 543 farms as well as 18,809,292 nursery pigs, 19,358,798 finish pigs, and 10,617,512 single-stocked wean-to-finish pigs. The genetic makeup of the pigs in the study is representative of current U.S. genetics and reflects almost every genetics company on either the sow or boar side, Eckberg says.
Here's a series of articles about this valuable tool for the pork industry.
Part 1:
Preweaning Piglet Mortality Hits Five-Year High
The National Pork Board wanted to provide U.S. pork producers the opportunity to gauge their progress against the top 10%, the average and the bottom 10% of the industry, so they could see where they fall and which areas they're doing well in and areas they need to focus more resources on, says Chris Hostetler, director of animal science of the National Pork Board.
He says the major difference between the top 10% and the bottom 10% in almost every category is pretty revealing and can help researchers identify areas where work is needed.
Part 2:
Mortality Continues to Challenge Pork Producers
Although not a big surprise, the production analysis summary revealed a continued mortality increase across all production phases. Sow death loss was at 12.6% and continues to be elevated compared to historical levels of 11.1% in 2017.
Eckberg notes the preweaning mortality gap between the top 10% and bottom 10% continues to be very wide (8.3% vs 20.2%).
“Sow mortality has been an issue for the past 10 years, continuing to rise every year. In 2021, it did go down slightly, but we are still at a level that continues to increase, which is a very big concern for the industry," Eckberg says. "We've had health breaks and porcine epidemic diarrhea (PED) in 2014. We've had bad porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) breaks here in 2020 and 2021, and obviously, the COVID effect in 2020 – none of that has been helpful from a mortality perspective.”
Part 3:
Don’t Miss the Bright Spots in the U.S. Pork Industry Benchmarking Data
The production analysis also uncovered many bright spots in the industry. From a performance standpoint, the total born averages in sow farms continues to rise. The average born alive was 13.6 and pigs weaned per sow at 11.40. Both are at five-year highs, Eckberg notes.
He credits genetic companies for continuing to push the norm to improve. He also notes the work producers have done to add farrowing space and ultimately get a bigger, hardier nursery pig to start.
More from Farm Journal's PORK:
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Legacy Means Different Things To Different People: Pig Farmers Respond
Colombia and Chile Offer Untapped Potential for U.S. Pork Industry
