The Manager of PigTrace Canada reports pork producers have responded positively to new requirements that took effect this summer for the mandatory reporting of swine movements in Canada.
Under new regulations, which took effect July 1 to accommodate traceability for the purpose of tracking swine disease, anyone who ships or receives pigs in Canada must report those movements to the PigTrace Canada database within seven days.
Jeff Clark, the manager of PigTrace Canada, an initiative of the Canadian Pork Council, told those on hand this week for Manitoba Pork’s fall producer meetings the level of participation has been overwhelming.
We’re about 120 days into the program and near as I can tell across Canada we have over half the premises in Canada reporting.
That’s about four thousand 300 premises reporting so really overwhelming response.
That’s not to say there’s not confusion or misinformation out there but by en large the people we work with and we help along, they get on the program.
We’ve had a lot of positive feedback.
The people that benefit are the people that work on our behalf in the pork industry to protect our herd health.
That’s our chief veterinarians in each of the provinces as well as CFIA.
If we have major outbreaks there’s information in PigTrace we can use to trace back and find out sites that may be affected.
With recent outbreaks of PED in Manitoba we’ve looked at the PigTrace data.
Mostly what producers care about is that it’s easy, it doesn’t cost them money and it’s not a hassle.
We really customize our tools for them based on their type of production and what their capabilities are.
I think once we deal with people it’s pretty positive.
It’s the people that maybe don’t get the information that can be frustrated.
Clark acknowledges it’s still a young system so it’s going to take some time to build upon the data but it does provide traceability.
