Swine Health Information Center Issues Second Request for Research Proposals Under Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Program

The Swine Health Information Center has issued a second request for research proposals under the Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Program.

The 2.3 million dollar Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Program, funded by the Swine Health Information Center, the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research and the Pork Checkoff was undertaken to develop cost effective ways to improve on-farm and transport biosecurity during the wean to harvest phase of pork production.

Swine Health Information Center Associate Director Dr. Megan Niederwerder says 10 projects have already been approved under the first call for proposals and submissions are being accepted until April 28th under the second call.

Clip-Dr. Megan Niederwerder-Swine Health Information Center:

The research priorities throughout the whole process have really focused across site and transport biosecurity.

But, in this second request for proposals we targeted five main areas within that umbrella of wean to harvest biosecurity, the first one being personnel biocontainment and bioexclusion, the second one being mortality management, the third one being truck wash efficiency, the fourth one being alternatives to fixed truck washes and the last one being packing plant or secondary market biocontainment.

We targeted these five main areas because these areas were not adequately addressed in the first call for research proposals.So, we really want to target those areas for researchers to develop ideas, innovations and proposals that help to address those five areas.

Dr. Niederwerder says one of the primary goals of this program is to attract research proposals that will provide value back to producers so it's important to think about how these new tools and novel technologies will be cost effective and will be able to be implemented in the industry to provide a return to pork producers.Program details and a link to the application form can be found at swinehealth.org.