There have been hogs on Darvin Firman’s farm since 1924, but by the end of March, the last 100 finishers will be gone.
His two barns, which until last July were used to feed 3,600 hogs a year, will be mothballed until the dark clouds swirling around the industry disappear.
Firman wouldn’t rule out the possibility of restocking his herd at some future date, but for now, one barn will be partly converted into a calving shed for the cattle on his 2,000 acre grain and cattle operation near Arborg, Man. The other will be used for storage.
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“The problem is that there is just too many hogs in Manitoba,” said Firman, who joked that he has spent only 16 days away from the animals in his 47 years.
“There’s also too many hogs in Canada and North America. As far as I’m concerned, this moratorium should have happened five years ago,” he added.
The NDP government’s ban on hog barn expansion in the Interlake, Manitoba’s southeast and the Red River Valley that came on the heels of the Clean Environment Commission’s report will help alleviate the glut of hogs on the market, but it’s happening for all the wrong reasons, he said.
“Blaming us for the phosphate levels in the lake, I think we have to look more at the cities, like with the way people fertilize their lawns. That’s where I feel most of the phosphate is coming from,” Firman said.
“Our manure is all contained in the lagoon and then injected into the soil. I doubt if there’s any hog manure that gets into the lake.”
Besides the high cost of barley and low hog prices, Firman said the last straw was an increase in freight costs to $9.50 per head that came after Maple Leaf rerouted slaughter hogs from Winnipeg to its Brandon plant.
“When you only get $89 a hog, that’s not good.”
Profits were also trimmed by demands from the pork processing giant for heftier pigs, and the requirement to send the animals to a mustering yard in Winnipeg where full loads of hogs from several farms could be assembled.
“They started raising heck with me about trim on the hogs, but it’s just the extra movement,” he said.
“I sold barley for four bucks a bushel, and here I am putting it into pigs. I don’t even want to think about how much I lost,” said Firman, who estimates that his losses last year could have been $60,000 to $100,000.
The threat presented by the proposed country-of-origin labelling requirement by the United States was another nail in the coffin.
“It scares the hell out of me,” said Firman. “When you have to rely on another province or country to do your killing for you, you’ve got a problem.”
Smaller operators, who carry little debt and who supply their own labour, might be able to bounce back faster than the larger farms if hog prices rebound, he said.
“The big guys are bleeding bad. They may have to shut down and go out of business,” he said.
“But if I never raise pigs again, it won’t be the end of the world for me.”
