A major announcement was made during this year’s 2014 World Pork Expo: TOPIGS International and Norsvin International have merged into one company: Topigs Norsvin. The merger will create a global swine breeding company with annual revenues in excess of US $179 million. The newly merged company’s headquarters will be located in Vught, the Netherlands. TOPIGS Nederland, Varkens K.I. Nederland and … Read More
Iowa Swine Day to Discuss Hot Topics in Pork
The pork industry’s response to federal action phasing out some antibiotics used to promote growth in hog production will be discussed June 26 at the third annual Iowa Swine Day at Iowa State University. “Presentations at Iowa Swine Day will provide current, science-based information on the topic of antibiotic growth promotion, its relationship with human health and how new federal … Read More
BIVI Explains ARC Programs & Swine Disease Control
Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica (BIVI) has been utilizing area regional control (ARC) programs with swine producers for more than six years. During their PEDV is Speaking: Are We Listening ? seminar at 2014 World Pork Expo, Dr. Erin Johnson, DVM, technical manager, PRRS Solutions Team explained that the goal of the ARC program, is to voluntarily get a group of producers … Read More
ISU's Dr. Gauger Explains All Things PEDV
The emergence of PEDV took the U.S. by storm and according to Dr Phillip Gauger, with Iowa State University, Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory, between April 28 – May 4, 2013 they had four separate ISU-VDL submissions – one from Indiana and three from Iowa – from farms with no relationship. He and his team realized after running diagnostic tests that more … Read More
5-Year PRRS Swine Health Monitoring Project Update
Dane Goede is a PhD student at the University of Minnesota and during grad school, he began working on the then, fairly new, Swine Health Monitoring Project. Today, he has the opportunity to continue working on the project and during a media dinner hosted by Boehringer Ingelheim (BIVI), attendees had the opportunity to learn about the results of the 5-Year … Read More
NPPC Industry Relations Update
Dr. Howard Hill, National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) president, veterinarian and producer from Cambridge, Iowa officially kicked off the 26th annual World Pork Expo 2014 (WPX) during a media press conference. He noted that WPX is the largest trade show and exhibition in the world and attendance was nearly 20,000 people over the three day show. Last year there were … Read More
AP Presents Hog Swine-asty at WPX
Uncle Pig-Sty and the whole Hogerson clan were happy, happy, happy at World Pork Expo as Automated Production Systems (AP) presented Hog Swine-asty for this year’s theme – and that’s a fact, Jack.. Every year AP has a different theme for their tender whole roast hog and they really go “whole hog” with costumes, music and even fun audience participation. … Read More
NPPC Environmental Issues Update
National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) president-elect Dr. Ron Prestage of South Carolina provided an update on some environmental issues on the forefront for the hog industry during World Pork Expo last week. First of all, Prestage says pork producers are encouraged by Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy, who has been in the position for the past year or so. … Read More
USDA PEDv Action Announced at WPX
This year was the first time Tom Vilsack visited World Pork Expo as Secretary of Agriculture and he did so to announce federal actions to help combat porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDv) and porcine deltacoronavirus (PDCoV). First of all, Vilsack says there is now a Federal Order requiring the reporting of new detections of these viruses to its Animal and … Read More
New Animal Ag Facility Lighting Debuts at WPX
As I mentioned in a post yesterday, there are loads of fun things to see, eat and learn about each year during the World Pork Expo. A new cool product that I ran across is an innovative new lighting system designed with the swine industry in mind. When speaking with Burlington-IA, Energyficient Systems CEO Chad Palmer (and designer) he explained … Read More