Managing through a porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome outbreak poses significant challenges, even under normal economic circumstances. In that moment, it’s hard to believe there could be anything worse. The reality is that regardless of the economic cycle phase, PRRS, porcine epidemic diarrhea and other disease can still strike. Times of disease challenges can potentially be farm-changing.
Pig farmers across America have tirelessly worked to safeguard their herds from PRRS and other diseases. Strategies such as locating farms in remote areas, incorporating air filtration to barns, building truck washes, incorporating feed mitigants and conducting extensive biosecurity training are common industry practices. Whiles some herds have been fortunate to avoid significant health issues, many experience intermittent breaks, leading to increased difficulty and longer stabilization periods. These events result in a higher cost structure during inflationary economic cycles.
Understanding where your farms stand within the industry and your own system is crucial. Embracing a data-driven approach and comprehending historical facts places pig farmers in the best position to make difficult decisions.
Collaborating with production record-keeping service providers can reveal how your farm performs compared to others in the industry. Leading providers publish an annual report detailing key production metrics, allowing you to assess your farm’s rank. Multi-year trends show operational performance percentiles. If farms consistently fall below the 30th percentile and fail to achieve a multi-year average in the top half of the industry metrics, it is critical to evaluate the long-term economic viability of that farm.
Some challenged farms are older with no debt. Despite the absence of debt service charges, regular interruption in throughput due to disease challenges can erode the advantage, making the farm vulnerable to long-term economic viability issues.
Similar comparisons should be made for nursery and finishing phase close-outs. Aggregating closed groups and comparing production metric percentiles is key. Assigning a cost factor to benchmarking exercises helps to understand opportunity cost between the best and underperforming groups.
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