REFLECTING ON PIGTRACE AFTER ONE YEAR
As PigTrace Canada nears the 1 year anniversary as the country’s mandatory pig traceability program, the number of pig movements reported to its national database is closing in on half a million, averaging nearly 10,000 movement events per week. This represents nearly 60 million pigs.
Since July 1, 2014 when federal regulations took effect, PigTrace has witnessed dramatic uptake by Canada’s pork industry, including large and small-scale production. More than 5,000 pig premises are consistently reporting movement events. This accounts for 63% of the total number of pig premises registered in PigTrace (8,200); however, the level of participation is likely higher than 63% because some of the registered premises are no longer in production.
The biggest surprise with the program so far has been the involvement of small-scale hobby producers, previously unknown to Canada’s provincial pork organizations. Nationally, at least 750 of small-scale producers are newly registered, and this number continues to grow. As a value added attribute for their customers, some producers have used PigTrace to track cuts of meat right back to specific pigs and the farms where they were raise.