Finding Latest Feed Info
UK delivered feed wheat prices rose last week, helped by further weakening of the Pound against the Euro, improving export competitiveness.

Soyameal International soyameal prices have continued to fall in recent weeks since the small gains made in late October. From a UK perspective the weakening of the Pound against the US Dollar has prevented the full price decrease being translated into Pounds per tonne

Knowledge Transfer

Tip of the week: Check your ventilation!
How can you ensure the ventilation in your pig accommodation is optimum for the pig?

Sit with the pigs - Get down to their level in their pens, checking air quality whilst walking through the middle passage when you are 6 foot tall is not the ideal measure. There are many fancy bits of kit to measure air quality and flow but two minutes at pig level will soon tell you if there is a problem.

Check user operation - Does everyone know how the ventilation system works? Is it easier for weekend staff to have written instructions on the wall next to the controls? Are their any instructions on farm to help staff alter the controls or know what to do if there are any mechanical failures?

Check capacities - Are fan sizes and speeds correct for the number and weights of pigs that you have in the building?

Monitor - Monitoring ongoing performance against the ventilation system can help you improve the environment and achieve greater growth rates.

Marketing News

Hog Roast A Winner
Pig farmers from across the UK held a series of free festive hog roasts to highlight their campaign for fairer prices and the battle to save Britain’s pig industry. TV chef Brian Turner joined pig farmers at London’s Waterloo station to launch the campaign at 9am on Monday 15th December, by offering free hot roast pork rolls for commuters.  850 pork roast sandwiches were given out to the public. Media update so far was that PA attended the event, BBC Radio London interviewed Brian Turner on the Sunday prior, Heart FM mentioned event on the breakfast show and BBC Radio 2 Terry Wogan, along with Capital, XFM And Capital Gold received sandwiches.  5 regional hog roasts also took place:- Truro- Cornwall by Sally Lung; Exeter – Andrew Freemantle; Hull – Mike Evison; Leeds – John Cobbald; and Colchester – David Harrison. Unfortunately Wolverhampton and Nottingham councils pulled the event. 26 radio stations covered the events

A Cut Above
The cuts poster used on the underground to highlight the plight of pig farmers, has been named in the “Top 10 posters of 2008” list by Campaign magazine.

National News:

Minister Supports Pig Industry
UK Farming Minister Jane Kennedy has assured pig producers that she will support the British pig industry following meetings last week.

Kennedy was given a guided tour along the pigmeat supply chain, from which she pledged to work with producers to address many of the concerns currently facing the industry.

Speaking after the event she said: “The experience served to confirm the fact that the British pig industry is producing some of the finest food to very high standards – from pig feed through animal welfare, to slaughter and processing onto our dinner tables.

“We can be proud of the quality assurance standards that run throughout the whole supply chain and we can have confidence that pork and other pigmeat products produced and processed by British farmers in the UK are safe to eat as well as tasty.

“I heard first hand of the concerns that are preoccupying the industry, from the recent incidents involving the risk of contamination from other countries products to the burden of regulation that many face through to the worries that the instability of prices in the current global market is having on prices.

“There is clearly a lot of work for us to do and I am reassured that all those involved are willing to work co-operatively to re-infuse confidence in the UK pig industry.”

Speed Up Payments Says Mandelson
Business Secretary Lord Mandelson has launched a new code of practice to help increase speed of payments to smaller businesses. It was developed in conjunction with the Institute of Credit Management (ICM) supported by major business organisations. The ICM will host the code on its website and will go live in early New Year.

Environment Taskforce Launched
Leading meat industry representatives from farmers through to retailers have come together to form an environmental taskforce to develop an environmental ‘roadmap’ for the sector.

The British meat industry is determined to play its part in meeting the UK’s carbon targets, as well as address the growing consumer awareness that activities commonly perceived as perfectly natural, such as grazing animals have environmental costs and benefits.

The Meat Roadmap will give the industry the tools it needs to address a broad range of environmental issues in addition to carbon across the product supply chain. It will do this by identifying practicable areas of improvement and challenging the industry through short, medium and longer term objectives.

One of the roles of the taskforce will be to identify common areas of improvement within the sectors and develop strategies that can be applied through existing programmes such as the beef and lamb Better Returns programmes.

A good deal of work has already been done, or is already in progress on environmental improvements in all sectors. One of the objectives of the task force is to ensure this work is accessible to businesses and consumers, while establishing and monitoring industry performance in relation to future environmental improvements.

Stuart Roberts of the British Meat Processors Association said: “The meat industry, like any other responsible sector of the economy, takes its environmental responsibilities seriously. We must, as a whole supply chain, work together to ensure our production is sustainable.“

“A lot of work has been carried out on measuring and mitigating the environmental impacts of meat production, and many of the quick but high-impact environmental wins are directly compatible with delivering more efficient production and saving costs.”

“However, we need to build on what we’ve done and we would like to emulate some of the excellent work undertaken to produce the Milk Roadmap, albeit on a bigger scale across a number of species.

“In part, this work will help us underline our environmental credentials but we can’t rest on our laurels. We need to commit ourselves to delivering practicable but challenging environmental achievements over the next 10-20 years.”

The development of a meat roadmap will help the industry identify measures to reduce the environmental impact of production, processing, transporting and consumption of meat products. Carbon emissions will be a key focus but a wider view of impacts as well as the potential impacts of mitigating actions will also be included.

The taskforce currently includes the National Farmers Union, the British Meat Processors Association, British Retail Consortium, English Beef and Lamb Executive, National Pig Association and the British Pig Executive.
A key stakeholder event will be held in the New Year to set out in more detail how the programme of work will be delivered and implemented. The first draft meat roadmap is expected to be produced by the autumn of next year.

International News:

Backing for Irish Support
The Member States today gave their backing to further exceptional market support measures for the Irish pork market in line with the Presidency conclusions of the Brussels European Council of 11-12 December 2008.

Last week the Commission already introduced, as an urgent support measure, a private storage aid scheme for up to 30,000 tonnes of pigmeat. That EU-funded storage scheme, which was formally adopted by the Commission today, covers meat coming from pigs reared in Ireland on farms that have not used any contaminated feed.

In addition, in view of the particularly difficult market situation in Ireland, the Commission has now proposed a further exceptional market support measure in the form of a disposal scheme for animals blocked on farms that have used contaminated feed as well as for certain pigmeat stocks held in slaughterhouses or still owned by the slaughterhouses.

The EU will co-finance the purchases at an average rate of 50 percent. Additionally, today's management committee backed a private storage aid scheme for Northern Ireland. Under this scheme, up to 15,000 tonnes of pigmeat can be stored for up to 6 months in Northern Ireland. The scheme follows the same approach as that introduced last week for Ireland.

"This is another concrete example of how the European Union can help Irish farmers at this difficult time," said Mariann Fischer Boel, Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development. "We hope that co-funding the destruction of affected meat will help bring this problem to a rapid conclusion and assist farmers who face financial difficulties."
The aim of this EU co-financed disposal scheme is to further contribute to the various measures already taken by the Irish authorities, and thus to remove the relevant animals and products from the market. The regulation on the disposal scheme provides that the financial compensation paid to the suppliers of the animals and of the pigmeat should be based on the market value of the products concerned.

Irish Pork Seized
Following the recent Irish recall of all pork and pigmeat due to the discovery of dioxin in meat samples, Italian Ministry of Health officials report that they have seized all 90 shipments of Irish pork to Italy and have increased sanitary controls of Irish beef imports as well.

The contamination in the Irish meat is believed to have originated from feedstuffs that include recycled bread and dough products. All consumers have been warned not to eat - and to destroy - any pork containing products produced since 1 September, 2008.

Press reports note that although the levels of dioxin found in Irish pork were said to be “as much as 100 times the accepted limit”, experts pointed out that even at these levels vast amounts would have to be consumed over a long period of time to create any cancer risk.

International Prices
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Bacon Sarnies Tops For Boris
Some day, this recession is going to end. Confidence is going to come surging back with all the biological inevitability of the new infatuation that follows a broken heart. In the meantime, there's always bicycle hire schemes and bacon sandwiches" - Boris Johnson, Mayor of London.