The Scoop

Brr…it’s cold outside

This week Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow. Did you know that means six more weeks of winter? That is certainly not what I wanted to hear. While the meteorologists do their best to predict the weather, it is up to each individual to be prepared for what Mother Nature decides to throw at us. Pork producers are going the extra mile this winter when it comes to transporting pigs in extremely cold weather. Producers check their equipment, road conditions and weather before hitting the road. They also make sure the pigs that will be hauled have the appropriate space, bedding and that the trailer has been prepared for the trip. The safety and well-being of the animals is the primary concern for pork producers. Watch for yourself.

As you prepare for six more weeks of winter, know that pork producers are also doing their best to care for their animals to provide you with a safe, high-quality product.

- Teresa Roof

Straight Talk from the Farm

When pork producers decide to euthanize a pig it is not entered into lightly.  The pork industry condemns willful abuse of any animal. Pork producers are committed to care for animals in a way that protects their well-being and as an industry there are educations and training programs – including Pork Quality Assurance Plus® -- to ensure that this takes place. 

The bottom line is that pigs are a producers livelihood.  It is how they provide for their families.  Euthanizing a pig isn't something that is entered into lightly.

Feeding a hungry world

The Bioeconomy Conference at Iowa State University this week is focusing on biofuels, but it raises a number of interesting challenges important to human survival.

Among them is the reality that the world is running out of places capable of growing food and energy crops. A second is that even by conservative estimates, total food production must grow by 50 percent or so by 2030 to feed a global population already experiencing food shortages.

There seems to be a lot of interest in the role of crop production as an answer to these challenges: less so in the role of protein production. Yet there are estimates that a third of the world population’s diets already are protein deficient. So while many of us in the pork production industry applaud the efforts to increase the production of what traditionally have been food crops, we have some difficulty understanding why there seems to be so much energy expended on limiting the growth of those who produce protein.

Pork producers, through their ingenuity, have made huge productivity advances in recent decades. Those gains have helped to feed hungry people around the world and to keep food prices low for American consumers. And despite the protests of those who don’t like the idea of production efficiency except when it comes to their pocketbooks, producers have made these gains while remaining true to their commitments to good animal husbandry practices and to environmental stewardship.

Serious questions about the long-term effects of increasing food productivity are appropriate. And as those questions get answered satisfactorily, we simply hope that pork producers get a fair chance to continue feeding a growing and hungry world.

- Mike Wegner

Don’t Jump Off the Deep End

An apple a day keeps the doctor away.  My grandmother used to tell me that when I was little.  I am not sure how much I believed her but I ate my apple anyway.  I probably would have rather had a candy bar.  But I am glad my grandmother was looking out for me.  She helped me develop some of the healthy habits I have today.

Like most adults, my grandmother made sure I was eating a well-balanced diet.  Of course she did let us indulge in the occasional chocolate chip cookie, candy bar or homemade ice cream but she was smart enough to know that moderation was the important factor. 

Unfortunately, some people just don't get it. Take the television commercial that links children’s consumption of hot dogs with colon cancer. The ad, sponsored by a pro-vegetarian group calling itself the Cancer Project, uses children to grab viewers’ attention.  One child says, “I was dumbfounded when the doctor told me I have late-stage colon cancer.”

While advertisement grabs your attention, it’s simply not true. None of the children who claim in the commercial to be afflicted actually has cancer. It is a dramatization that highlights research linking processed meats with higher odds of getting colon cancer. But the connection is based on studies of adults, not children.

Yes, hot dogs aren’t exactly a health food, but eating one every now and then probably won’t hurt you.  The truth is processed pork fits into established nutrition guidelines, including the U.S. Dietary Guidelines, which recommend at least 30 minutes of physical activity and an average of 5.5 ounces from the Meat and Beans Group daily.

It’s like what grandma taught me, the important thing is moderation. And remember a balanced diet and exercise is the key to staying healthy.  Pork can fit into that healthy lifestyle, too!

- Teresa Roof

Living the American Dream

Emily Kilian
Emily Kilian was intern for the communications department this summer at the National Pork Board. Emily will graduate from Oklahoma State University in May of 2009 with a degree in agricultural communications.

Oklahoma really is “where the wind comes sweeping down the plains,” and to me, it’s home. Growing up in Oklahoma, I didn’t know much about the pork industry. I owned a few show pigs, but my family did not raise hogs commercially. My family’s farm is full of wheat and beef cattle. I grew up in a small town, so I am not a city kid or a country kid – I’m a mix. I can clean out a barn or get all dressed up for a night on the town. I can drive a John Deere or a Mercedes.

One thing I couldn’t do was talk about the pork industry. My knowledge of the pork industry was slim at best. Before starting my internship with the Pork Checkoff in May, I didn’t know the difference in the National Pork Board and the National Pork Producers Council. I didn’t know all the work that went in behind the scenes to market pork, not only in the United States, but also across the world. I also didn’t know the important steps being taken to make sure pigs are being treated humanely.

Producers take great pride in what they do, and through programs like Operation Main Street, producers can share their world with you. The farm has never been closer to you than it is now, with YouTube videos explaining the how’s and why’s to pork production. The Pork Checkoff also has programs for producers that reaffirm their commitment to animal welfare. Pork Quality Assurance Plus®, Transport Quality Assurance and the new responsible pork initiative are all aimed at keeping pigs safe. The responsible pork initiative, also called ‘We Care,’ goes beyond making sure pigs are safe. It challenges producers to do the right thing for their animals, the environment and consumers. This initiative is designed so the public will gain trust of the pork industry.

Trust is a strong word. It carries with it a high degree of integrity. This integrity is exactly what pork producers have. From this internship experience, I learned there is no such thing as a “factory farm”.  Pork producers are family-oriented, everyday men and women simply trying to live the American dream. And as a consumer, buying pork will help make their dreams come true. It’s not every day you get a chance to help dreams come true.

- Emily Kilian

Are You Bitter or Better?

That is the question several farmers maybe asking themselves after the floods of 2008.  I know all too well the damages of the flooding.  Having grown up on a farm in southeast Iowa and having witnessed first-hand the destruction of the raging waters, I wonder how those farmers are going to rebound from this great loss.  If you turned on the national news in the past few weeks you have seen the accounts of the damage – pets lost; people fleeing homes; pigs on the top of barns; the list goes on.  What you didn’t see was all the preparation, hard work and sleepless nights before the waters came.

You didn’t see all the grain trucks and livestock trucks running up and down the road the days prior to the waters engulfing the fields and barns. Or farmers on higher ground providing empty barns to house other farmers’ pigs. Or neighbors helping neighbors move their belongings to higher ground.  The land, the buildings, the livestock are all how these farmers make a living for their families.  Farmers understand the value of these assets and the importance of protecting them.

In fact, doing everything they can do take care of their neighbors, their property and their animals is not something farmers have ever talked about much.  Producers were not challenged on issues like these until recently.  Now they are being asked to prove it.

Proof should be the actions taken in the recent flood.  But in most cases, that isn’t enough.  So, producer leaders recently adopted a Statement of Ethical Principles.  Under those principles, pork producers have affirmed their obligation to:

• Produce safe food
• Safeguard natural resources in all industry practices
• Provide a work environment that is safe and consistent with the industry’s other ethical principles
• Contribute to a better quality of life in communities
• Protect and promote animal well-being
• Ensure practices to protect public health

This is one more affirmation that producers are doing the right thing.  Producers will continue to do the right thing as the flood waters recede.  As they face the difficult task of rebuilding and replanting, they can either be bitter about their situation or get better because of their situation.  Knowing producers as I do, my money is on better.

- Teresa Roof

Connecting the Dots

There’s been some press about Methicillin Resistant Staph Aureus (MRSA) the last week that has caused some to question the role of pigs and pork in how this bug moves and affects people.  One article implied that since a strain found in some people in the UK was the same as a strain that has been found in pigs those people must have been infected by eating pork.

One thing that we’ve learned over many years of studying bacteria – how they move, how they adapt, how they infect, how they cause illness – is that rarely are things as clear as connecting dots.  Foodborne outbreaks of disease are one thing.  You can interview people that are sick and people that aren’t; find out what the sick people ate that the others didn’t; test the food that looks to be involved; and match that bug up with what you find in the sick people.  The dots are connected.  But when you investigate how bacteria move in a population it very often is not that clear at all.

This MRSA issue is a great example.  Apparently none of these three people in the UK had direct contact with pigs so the assumption was made that they were infected by eating pork.  But did they live with dogs, cats, or some other pet?  We know that MRSA has been found in dogs, cats, horses, pet birds, turtles, rabbits, and a variety of food animals like pigs, chickens, sheep and cattle.  And researchers in Germany and Austria have found the identical strain that came from the people in the UK in dogs and horses and other food animals.

I know that the Dutch have been studying MRSA for quite a few years.  Their food safety authority, the National Institue for Public Health and Environment, and the Dutch Animal Health Service don’t consider MRSA to be a food safety threat.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), here in the U.S., sent a letter to Congress in response to a question from a U.S. Representative that said that there is no documented role for meat consumption or handling in MRSA transmission and that none of the investigations of community-associated MRSA infections in the United States has identified animal exposure as a risk factor for infection.  The CDC also says that the most commonly found strain of MRSA in pigs is not associated with community-associated MRSA infections in the United States,  such as those acquired at hospitals, gymnasiums, assisted living facilities, etc.

All this should give some reason to pause – but not a reason to stop.  We do need to know more about MRSA and how it acts and moves between people and animals, animals and people and people and people.  But in the mean time, I don’t think it makes sense to jump to conclusions when there are so many questions yet to be answered.

So, what is going on and what can be done right now?  Just because we don’t have all the answers doesn’t mean that we should sit and wait.  Farmers are working every day with their animals.  People have pets.  Everybody trades bacteria and viruses every day when passing money, greeting someone by shaking their hand, opening a door, riding in a cab or doing just about everything else that we do as a normal part of life.

MRSA seems to like to live in the nose, and it isn’t sexy, but general hygiene and frequently washing your hands is the place to start.  Even though MRSA probably isn’t a food borne issue, there are plenty of bacteria that are.  Wash your hands and cooking utensils after handling raw meat of any kind.  Cook your food to its proper temperature.  Put it in the refrigerator right away after the meal.  And heat it back up to at least 140 degrees before eating those leftovers.

For farmers working with pigs, there is a lot of research going on.  Dr. Tara Smith, at the University of Iowa found that in some pork production operations up to 70 percent of the animals carry MRSA.  And she also found that other farms didn’t have it at all.  We need to know why there’s a difference.  And we need to know if there is anything that can be done to keep the bug from passing between animals and people.

- Dr. Paul Sundberg

Pigs Survive Twister

Weather certainly is unpredictable.  It seems like there has been several tornados ripping across the U.S. in the past few weeks.  One image that sticks out in my mind is the photos from the twister that destroyed three barns at a hog farm near Lacey in Kingfisher County, about 75 miles northwest of Oklahoma City.   

The images are plain as day.  The farm took a direct hit.  And yet, the pigs are still alive while everything else around them is rubble.  How did this happen?  The pigs were housed in stalls.  The stalls protected the pigs from the twister similar to how your basement would protect you. 

There are those who argue pigs shouldn’t be kept in stalls because they can’t even turn around are unable to perform nearly any of their natural behaviors.  But the outcome of this twister may have been different if the pigs were not in stalls. 

Scientific research has shown that there are several different types of production systems that are good for pigs. What really matters is not so much the type of production system, but the individual care given to each pig. Using the knowledge obtained from science, producers have adopted and adapted techniques and husbandry skills to provide for the well-being of their animals.

In 1996, the National Pork Board gathered a group of international experts in sow housing and well-being and asked them to do a complete review of the scientific literature on the subject.  In 2005, the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) independently did the same thing.

National Pork Board research as well as the review by the AVMA, concludes that there are advantages and disadvantages to all types of sow housing systems.  The major factor affecting the well-being of the sow in housing continues to be the skill and management of the person taking care of the animal.

So next time the weather turns deadly and you head to your basement, don’t think twice about pigs being kept in stalls.  It may save their lives.

- Teresa Roof

Pig Farmers Take Action

Routine abuse?  I think not.  But the Humane Society of the United States and other groups would like you to believe that is the truth.  The truth is producers take great pride in caring for their animals.  They follow good production practices outlined by the industry to provide consumers a safe, wholesome, healthy product.  Need more convincing?  Take a look at this.

So don’t think twice the next time you take a bite of pork.  You can feel assured that it came from animal that has been treated humanely.

- Teresa Roof

Battling Through Tough Times

Farmers that raise animals for food are going through a pretty tough time right now.  Corn and soybeans are the staples of our food animal diets.  It’s been said that the Midwest section of the U.S. is the bread basket of the world and there is good reason to believe that is true. 

But whether it is domestic demand, international demand, increased ethanol demand or whatever the reason, the fact is that there is not enough of these grains to go around and that has caused the price to sky rocket.  Seventy or more percent of the cost of raising a pig to sell at the market is feed cost.  When the price of the basics of that feed – corn and soybeans – goes up 300+%, the cost of producing a pig goes up by at least that much too.

Pork producers have to feed their animals.  It’s humane and the right thing to do. So, right now and for the foreseeable future, the very high price of grain means that most pork producers have to sell their animals at prices that ensure that they will lose money.  They have to sell at a price that won’t cover the cost of feed that they have to use.  The difference is as much at $40 to $50 even $60 per animal!  Every pig that goes to market is costing that much more to raise than the market is paying.  In just about any other business, if it costs you to make something for $50 more than you could get when you sell it, you wouldn’t do it any longer.

That’s our challenge right now.  If economics works (and it does), when pork producers leave the business because of these losses, eventually the supply is going to go down and when demand is pretty much the same because people like to eat pork the cost has to go up. 

It’s in everybody’s interest to buy pork now.  It puts pork in your freezer at a reasonable price and it helps to keep farmers that raise pigs in business while this whole feed issue gets sorted out.

- Dr. Paul Sundberg