A new national farm level biosecurity training program for swine operations will be rolled out in Saskatchewan early in the new year.
The National Biosecurity Training Program, based on the National Farm Level Biosecurity Standard developed by the Canadian Swine Health Board, was launched earlier this year in Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba and is now being rolled out in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
Saskatchewan Pork Development Board Producer Services Manager Harvey Wagner notes funding is available to cover the costs of veterinary visits to participating farms and additional incentives are now in the works.
Basically any farm that’s raising pigs that’s participating in the CQA Program, so farms who are in commercial hog production in Saskatchewan basically, we have nearly 160 units in Saskatchewan that would be eligible.
We’re targeting to have at least 100 in this first brush in 2012.
They’ll be trained by their veterinarian or a veterinarian that they’re associated with in the biosecurity standard.
At that time they’ll take the standard and work through it at their own pace and find two primary things that they can do on their farm to improve biosecurity.
Once they’ve done that then their herd health veterinarian will come and review the standard with them, see what they’ve done, how it applies to their farm and then they can become engaged in the standard so they’ll officially be registered as a participant in the biosecurity standard.
Wagner says the training of the veterinary trainers will be happening in early January, after that the trainers will set up training sessions with the farms and then move forward from there.
He says, although the program hasn’t been very aggressively publicized yet, producers are already expressing interest and, as we move forward, he expects interest to build.
