Manitoba Pork Council will be among the livestock groups taking part in "Thru the Farmgate" held in conjunction with the 2010 Royal Manitoba Winter Fair which begins Monday in Brandon with an updated display.

Thru the Farmgate offers a hands on opportunity to question livestock producers, learn about what goes on on a livestock operation and see and touch the animals.

Manitoba Pork Council manager of communication and media programs Kelly Funke notes, in Manitoba, most people live in Winnipeg or smaller cities or towns where they have little exposure to farming and are less informed about agriculture.

Kelly Funke-Manitoba Pork Council

Those not involved in agriculture are still the customers.

They are the people who consume the products that we all produce and so for them to have as much information as possible about those products is very important and to build bridges with those people will do a service for producers.

I suppose that what we would is that fostering an understanding of agricultural practices and, for the pork industry in particular, we have struggled in the past to create that understanding especially among those who are not connected to the farm at all and, as you may know, that population is growing all the time where as the population connected to the farm is shrinking so it's very important for us to build those bridges, foster understanding and teach people about what we do.

Ms Funke says, in addition to a live animal display featuring three weanling pigs, the new pork exhibit borrows the Crime Scene Investigation theme, encouraging visitors to investigate the facts and fictions of pork production.

Additional information on Thru the Farmscape is available at brandonfairs.com.