Technical support for Easicare and H. M. Boot DOS-based systems has been withdrawn by software company Agrosoft as of 31 March 2008 and ACMC is now providing producers with another option.

Easicare was originally developed by the Curtis family, founders of ACMC. The company say it can successfully import data and convert all sow records into an updated windows-based formatthrough its PigCom program.

"Apart from the obvious differences in data entry between DOS and windows, users should experience a degree of familiarity with reports, albeit with improved graphing and consolidated reporting," commented Ed Sutcliffe, ACMC's technical director.

Ed Sutcliffe, Technical Director, ACMC.

Easicare - market leader in DOS-based herd recording in the 1980s and 1990s - was an outstanding product. The system was taken over when NPD, was bought by Dalgety, and subsequently sold to Agrosoft. There has been little development to the program since 2001.

PigCom software can be used both as an aid to weekly routines and to help with vital business management systems through identifying Key Performance Indicators.

Multiple herds can be recorded by one system and, where required, these can be consolidated for an overall view. Entering data is straight-forward and the system has good editing and search capabilities. Reports and data can be electronically exported as attachments to emails.

The system can be used to provide data to the British Pig Executive's (BPEX) PCV2 vaccination initiative. Statistics can be submitted easily to the project a research project, says ACMC.