Canada’s hog herd is up in the West and down in the East, for an overall decline of almost one percent.
Statistics Canada’s Oct. 1 quarterly report on the industry shows the hog breeding expansion trend in the three prairie provinces has continued.
However, this is the third quarter that breeding stock numbers in the East have declined.
The breeding herd in Canada’s largest pig producing province, Quebec, declined by three percent to 372,500 head compared to Oct. 1, 1999.
Ontario’s breeding herd also declined by three percent to 338,300 head.
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Manitoba’s breeding herd increased by six percent to 263,800, Saskatchewan’s by 21/2 percent to 103,400 and Alberta’s by almost four percent to 193,400.
The report also shows prairie hog producers have consistently higher farrowing rates than their Quebec and Ontario colleagues, meaning the rate of growth of production is much higher in the West.
Another indicator of the westward shift in the hog industry is news that Manitoba slaughter plants are drawing animals from as far east as Quebec.
Manitoba Agriculture said last week that slaughter capacity problems in Quebec have depressed hog prices in the East.
Ontario hogs that were going to Quebec for slaughter and even some Quebec hogs are, at least for now, being trucked to meet the voracious appetite of Manitoba’s plants.
The pull of the West’s under-used packing plants is sure to encourage more hog production in the future.
This force will regularly collide with concerns about manure causing smell and water quality problems.
One possible solution is to increase the value of manure so it becomes accepted as a resource instead of a pollutant.
So far, the focus has been on its value as a fertilizer, but new ideas are even more intriguing.
On page 23 this week is the story of a proposal for Hanna, Alta., that would separate manure of a huge hog operation into methane for electricity generation, water for a greenhouse and solid waste for compost.
Last week in Iowa, the state and a private power generator announced a project to collect the methane from a 700-head dairy herd to produce electricity to supply about 50 homes.
In addition to the electricity, the project will also reduce smells and prevent the methane, a potent global warming gas, from entering the atmosphere.
