Farm-Scape is sponsored by Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork Play Audio Farm-Scape is a Wonderworks Canada production and is distributed courtesy of Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork.

Farm-Scape, Episode 1354

The University of Alberta has officially opened a new 15 hundred square foot Pork Industry Interpretive Centre.

The Pig Science Centre is a stand alone component of the University of Alberta's Swine Research Technology Centre and is located on its South Campus in the heart of Edmonton's south side.

The project was spearheaded in partnership with Alberta Pork which will staff and operate facility.

U of A Swine Research Program Leader Dr. George Foxcroft says the facility is located outside the main research area allowing public access without the need to adhere to the high health protocols in the main barn.

"The 15 hundred square foot area gives visual access to two key rooms.

One is a farrowing room in which the public can see lactating sows with young piglets and the second very large area is our gestation area where we have the animals housed in what we call a free access stall facility during their pregnancy period.

The purpose of the centre is to give a particularly urban public, which exists in Edmonton, some insight into pork production. The target is to look at grades four to six in the education system.

The feeling was that we needed to gain access to school children at a fairly early age before they developed any particular perceptions of food production, in particular meat production systems.

We're particularly targeting the younger generation of urban school children because we believe that is a key area where we need to get a good understanding of modern food production systems".

Dr. Foxcroft says, to quote Alberta Pork, the idea is to give people the opportunity to take an inside look at the pork industry in a way they otherwise never could.

For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.