Manitoba Pork Establishes Working Group to Examine Disease Control and Prevention

Mar 14, 2022

The impact of COVID-19 and Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea on Manitoba's pork sector has prompted the creation of a working to group to look for possible solutions. In response to the impacts of the global COVID-19 pandemic and the cycle of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea outbreaks, Manitoba Pork has established a value-chain working group to answer the question, what do we need to do differently to deal with disease and potentially help prevent the next pandemic.

Cam Dahl, the General Manager of Manitoba Pork, says disease control and prevention is a priority.

Clip-Cam Dahl-Manitoba Pork:

The understanding of the need for very strong biosecurity measures has really dramatically increased in the last five years in the pork sector. There isn't a pork producer that I talk to that isn't aware of the need to have really strict biosecurity measures in their operations. Most people I talk to are surprised when you tell them that you need to shower when you go into a pork barn, not necessarily when you come out.

That awareness has come about because of outbreaks like PED and producers taking the steps to keep it out of their herds but it's also come about because of outside threats like African Swine Fever and looking at the damage that diseases like that have done in other countries and the cost. There's a real recognition that we need to take those steps to keep diseases out and to control them if they do arrive.

I think COVID-19 has brought the awareness of biosecurity to the general public. Social distancing and tracking and tracing our contacts if we become sick and taking measures like masks, those are all biosecurity measures so the awareness has come about in the public as well because of COVID-19 and that's a good thing.

Source : Farmscape

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.