It’s time for the Manitoba government to back its promise to become a major hog producer and provide the means to make that happen.
That was a message some officials of Manitoba Pork, the agency that sells 80 percent of the province’s hogs, took to the agency’s annual meeting in Brandon April 15.
Producers in this province are going to be scrambling to raise the hogs needed to feed processors here once Maple Leaf’s 45,000-hog a week plant starts production next summer.
If the $112-million cut and kill plant was the only one in the province, supply wouldn’t be a problem.
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But with expansions planned at three of the province’s other four packers, hogs will be a hot commodity.
Manitoba Pork chair Gerry Friesen said 100,000 hogs a week will be needed once Maple Leaf’s plant moves into its second shift.
The province is hoping to increase production to seven or eight million hogs, but that might take some help from the province, he said.
“Some of the onus is on the provincial government who is promoting this industry so they also have to make sure they fulfill responsibilities there as far as making sure the hog industry is allowed to grow,” Friesen said.
“They can’t take a completely hands-off approach.”
Friesen called for consistency in the way municipalities approve or deny applications for hog operations.
So far, the province has said it won’t tamper with the authority municipalities have over how they handle applications.
“Now a municipality can turn down an application and give no reason why. There’s got to be some accountability,” he said.
“We have to make sure in conflicts between producers and citizens groups to maintain a level playing field.”
Ted Muir, head of industry services for Manitoba Pork, said the province should step up its role in protecting agricultural land from urban sprawl.
“Our governments are showing no leadership in controlling the rush of people wanting to turn the country into city,” Muir told producers during the meeting.
“As long as people encroach on farmland just willy nilly, we’re not going to be able to produce food and they’re doing very little in Manitoba to stop that problem in its tracks.”
