Sask Pork and biosecurity management technology firm Farm Health Guardian have inked a deal to provide the software system to all hog farms in the province.
“We’re pleased to provide this technology to help producers improve biosecurity and protect their herds from disease across Saskatchewan,” Mark Ferguson, Sask Pork’s general manager, said in an April 14 news release.
“Having real-time truck movement data for swine farms can help protect healthy animals and speed up response time in the event of a disease outbreak.”
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Why it Matters: Tracking of vehicle and animal movements becomes key in cases of disease outbreaks on hog farms.
Truck GPS data and geofencing technology will be used for Saskatchewan’s commercial hog farms. Third-party vehicles such as feed trucks and live haul trailers will also be linked to Farm Health Guardian software, Sask Pork said.
Trucks that don’t already have GPS can buy devises from Farm Health Guardian to join the network.
This will provide a real-time view of movement across the farms.
Demonstrating effective disease surveillance and containment is key for maintaining market access for Saskatchewan’s largely export-oriented hog sector, Sask Pork said.
The service is expected to be available by August.
Software found wide use in Manitoba swine sector
Farm Health Guardian is in wide use among Manitoba hog farms. In 2022, chief executive officer Rob Hannam told Glacier FarmMedia he estimated that about half of the province’s pig farms used the service for things such as biosecurity tracking and data collection.
The same year, Farm Health Guardian partnered with Manitoba’s Squeal on Pigs campaign to allow people to report sightings of wild pigs through its app.
Farm Health Guardian operates out of Guelph, Ont., and Omaha, Nebraska.
