An estimated 40 percent of Ontario pork producers have now completed the first stage of a new national on-farm biosecurity training program.
The National Biosecurity Training Program, developed by the Canadian Swine Health Board to familiarize pork producers with best management practices related to biosecurity and provide suggested changes to improve biosecurity, was launched in Ontario, Manitoba and Quebec in mid-2011.
Dr. Mike DeGroot, the Biosecurity Coordinator with Ontario Pork, reports interest in the program in Ontario has been strong.
The training will cover all aspects of biosecurity dealing first with how staff and visitors are getting on farm and into the barns as well as controlling disease spread by pigs and other indirect sources such as equipment, rodents, pests, those sorts of things.
The training program is being delivered by veterinarians in an in-class session to begin with and then veterinarians are doing an on farm vet visit to suggest improvements for each farm.
The interest has been very good in Ontario.
For the in-class sessions of the National Biosecurity Training Program there’s about 950 producers trained in Ontario and for the vet visits, the on site visits done by the veterinarian, over 500 sites have been completed.
As a proportion of the industry, that would probably reflect about 40 percent of the producers have received the in-class training.
Dr. DeGroot suggests, for individual farms, the National Biosecurity Training Program offers an opportunity to discuss improving biosecurity practices with their veterinarians while increasing the awareness among staff on the importance of biosecurity.
For the industry as a whole, he says, if each farm is making changes to improve biosecurity that will enhance the biosecurity of the industry altogether.
