CME: New Systems Could Lead to Costs & Tradeoffs
US - The push towards the elimination of gestation stalls for pregnant sows received some additional momentum yesterday as McDonalds announced that 10 years from now it will purchase all its pork from facilities that do not use such housing systems, write Steve Meyer and Len Steiner.Ten years is a long time and should allow some producers
to change their production practices given the nascent demand for
this type of pork. It will allow them to also charge a premium for
doing so. The decision from McDonalds fits with announcements
from some large pork producers to eliminate gestation stall systems
from their operations by the end of the decade. We have
covered this topic extensively before.
So far, much
of the discussion in the media has been dominated by activist
groups that focus on very specific aspects of gestation stalls, such
as confinement and not enough attention has been given to how
alternative systems, such as group housing or various hybrids,
compare to the current environment. There is far too many people,
families and companies for whom the welfare of hogs is not a
bullet point in a CSR PowerPoint slide. For them, it is a daily
concern and preoccupation.
It is important that farmers and producers
that care for these animals on a daily basis have a say in
the debate as do animal scientists, veterinarians and people in the
academia. As we have noted before, new systems can be put in
place but there will be costs and tradeoffs. “The tradeoffs are
more sow injuries, higher feed costs (mobility takes energy), higher
labor costs, and very likely more injuries to workers. Those will
not be free and, in the long run, consumers pay all costs. That last
one always seems hard to remember.