Cramer Ag Expo
Stop in Thursday February 13th, 2020 at the 10th annual sold out Cramer Expo in Swift Current, SK. The one day show will be held at the Kinetic Exhibition Park, featuring a trade show, door prizes, silent and live auction and of course the Cramer Cup series. Show opens at 8:30 am.
The largest multispecies show in Southern Saskatchewan always attracts a full house.
Please contact Kelly Turcotte trade show co ordinator at 306. 737.6262 or email kelly_turcotte@hotmail.com. For questions about Cramer Cup Series contact Doug Cramer at 306.520.3553 or email
cramerexpomgmt@gmail.com •

APC Industry Award Nominations
Now is the time to send in your nominations for the Alberta Pork Congress Industry Awards.
Lifetime Achievement Award (Honours individuals who have played an integral role in advancing the pork industry in Alberta and celebrates their long-term commitment and unwavering dedication to the industry).
Farm Team Award (Recognizes the farm unit which operates in an exemplary manner through commitment and longevity of the staff with virtues of hard work and cooperation, celebrating dedication of the team toward working together for the success of the farm).
Pork Industry Ambassador Award (Honours individuals or companies whose efforts reflect a commitment above and beyond the accepted expectation of the pork industry in Alberta. It recognizes individuals or companies whose actions have become a valuable asset to the pork industry and acknowledges those whose actions have become models for peer recognition).
Rising Star Award honours an individual who has been a part of the Alberta pork industry for less than 5 years and planning a career in the industry.
For more information or to nominate either a individual – team, please contact the Alberta Pork Congress office at 403.244.7821 or Toll Free 1.800.267.9180 or email info@albertaporkcongress.com. Deadline for nominations is February 28th. •

2020 Livestock Care Conference
Registration is now open for the 2020 edition of the Livestock Care Conference, hosted by Alberta Farm Animal Care. This year’s theme is “Raising the Bar.”
This leading farm animal care event takes place March 18 and 19, 2020, at the Pomeroy Inn and Suites in Olds, Alberta. Visit the AFAC website, www.afac.ab.ca, and click on Livestock Care Conference for complete information. •

MPC Annual General Meeting
The 2020 Manitoba Pork Council Annual General Meeting will take place at the Fairmont Winnipeg Wednesday March 25th. •

London Swine Conference
Tha annual London Swine Conference will be held March 31st & April 1st in London ON at the Double Tree Hilton in London ON. For details and registration check out www. londonswineconference.ca
Register Online or contact Sandra McCann, OMAFRA Phone: 519.482.3333 or Email: sandra.mccann@ontario.ca No registrations at the door. •

Montana Livestock Expo
The 2nd annual The Montana Livestock and Crop Production Expo presented by Friesen Nutrition will take place in Great Falls MT Thursday April 16th, 2020. As of press time only few booths left.
This show will be an “ All Business “ Ag Trade Show showcasing New and Existing Technology in animal nutrition, livestock equipment, cropping advances, agronomy, and genetic companies.
The show will give producers and suppliers the opportunity to meet many new contacts and forage new business relationships.
This event will be managed by Cramer Expo and Event Management Company.
Contact Doug or Kelly today for more information at Doug Cramer: 306.520.3553 or cramerexpomgmt@gmail.com
Kelly Turcotte: 306.737.6262 or
kelly_turcotte@hotmail.com details also on line at
www.cramereventmanagement.com •

2020 ANCC Conference
The Animal Nutrition Conference of Canada (ANCC) will take place in Winnipeg May 12-16th at the Fairmont Winnipeg Hotel. Theme of this years conference is Exploring the Links Between Animal Nutrition and Animal Health.
Check the website for details, registration and program details.
www.animalnutritionconference.ca •

Alberta Pork Congress
The 46th annual Alberta Pork Congress will be held in the new Exhibition Hall at Westerner Park in Red Deer June 10th & 11th.
As of press time the trade show booth space is 70% sold, so do not delay book your space today. Online registration is open at albertaporkcongress.com. Should you have any questions or to order your BBQ, lunch and banquet tickets please contact the Kyla in the office at 403.244.7821 or email kyla@albertaporkcongress.com •

Porkapalooza
The 7th annual Porkapalooza BBQ Festival will once again be hosted and organized by Alberta Pork. In Edmonton May 30th & 31st, this year with a new twist conjunction with Edmonton Craft Beer Festival. What a great combination Beer & BBQ.
More details will be available in the future.
Check out their website for more details
porkapalooza.ca for updates. •

Ontario Pork Congress
The annual Ontario Pork Congress will be held in Stratford June 17th & 18th
Details available on their website at
porkcongress.on.ca •

Humane Transport Regulations in Effect Next Month
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s (CFIA) Health of Animals Regulations will change next month, following several years of consultation with industry. The changes, affecting animal transporters, were first announced in February 2019 and will officially come into force on February 20, 2020.
The new requirements have been introduced and take an outcome-based approach to ensure the proper care of animals in transit. See the summary of changes that compares the 2019 amendments with the original 1977 requirements, and see the timeline of changes that details the development process.
The most-significant change specifically affecting hog transport is that pigs must not be without feed, water or rest for more than 28 hours. After this maximum amount of time has been reached, pigs are required to be given a period of eight hours to be fed, watered and rested.
While the change to rest hours is significant in nature, many other subtle changes have been made as part of modernizing and standardizing the regulation. In the coming year, Alberta Pork will modify its training materials to reflect these changes, and information sessions will assist self-hauling producers in adapting their transport practices.
CFIA will implement a transition period for livestock sectors, including pork, to respond to the changes. During the first two years, CFIA will focus its enforcement efforts on compliance promotion through education and awareness. Learn more about CFIA humane transport and animal welfare.
If you have any questions or concerns, contact Javier Bahamon, Quality Assurance and Production Manager, Alberta Pork by email at javier.bahamon@albertapork.com or by phone at 780.469.8982, or contact Cristina Neva, Quality Assurance and Production Specialist, Alberta Pork by email at cristina.neva@albertapork.com or by phone at 780.440.8458. Alternatively, phone 1.877.247.PORK (7675). •
— Alberta Pork

Vaccine Found for African Swine Fever
Researchers have developed a vaccine that is proving effective against African Swine Fever.
The work has been done by United States Department of Agriculture scientists at the Plum Island, New York, site for the Agriculture Research Service.
They are ready to begin trials in commercial herds.
The early results of the trial look promising as all pigs in remained essentially free of clinical signs of the disease after being exposed to the complete virus.
Unvaccinated pigs in the groups also remained free of clinical signs, indicating that the vaccine does not increase the risk of other animals contracting the virus through shedding.
This new vaccine was developed upon the discovery that deletion of a previously uncharacterised viral gene produces complete attenuation in swine.
The vaccine has been trialled in a clinical environment, with all animals inoculated intramuscularly with the gene-deleted virus remaining clinically normal during the 28-day observational period.
The new vaccine was described in the published paper as “one of the few experimental vaccine candidate virus strains reported to be able to induce protection against the ASFv Georgia isolate, and the first vaccine capable of inducing sterile immunity against the current ASFv strain responsible for recent outbreaks.” •
— By Jim Romahn

ASF Vaccine Needed – But Don’t Rush it
An article that appeared on The Pig Site Dec 19, 2019, said reports emerged of a successful vaccine, developed by researchers from the Agricultural Research Service based at Plum Island, New York.
International livestock consultant, world-renowned veterinarian, and lecturer Dr. John Carr, when contacted on the news, said it should work. “But I seriously worry about rushing – we need to be sure about this. ASF creates excellent immunity to the particular strain, so vaccination is going to be successful. BUT there is so much hype – I worry science and proof go out of the window,” said Dr. Carr. “Again, obviously the vaccine will be great – we need it – but over the years even with human diseases, so much of this hype is about the rush for getting funds – not really about fixing the problem. The Chinese have 3000 Ph.D. guys looking for a vaccine!! The U.S. (and now Canada) have but a handful.”
He said apart from another publicity stunt – It is not what we can do for them (meaning the researchers), but what can they do for the pig.
“The worrying words are ‘looks promising,’ so this is very, very early results. The tests were only over a month? And I bet the trial was only over five pigs,” said Carr. “They should not be allowed to publish this as it only gets people hopes up – and we have already been here a few times. This is like crying wolf!!”
Dr. Carr said, are they looking for a vaccine — of course. Are there promising results – yes! When will it be available? 5 years? Wonder where they are going to do their trials – cannot be in the United States.
“It is just a shame they didn’t carry out this work in the last 40 years – so that Africans could have developed their industry and fed people – but how they have no money!”
Further to the article in The Pig Site, the early results of the trial look promising as all pigs remained essentially free of clinical signs of the disease. That said, the article after being exposed to the complete virus. Unvaccinated pigs in the groups also remained free of clinical signs, indicating that the vaccine does not increase the risk of other animals contracting the virus through shedding. •
— By Harry Siemens

China Cuts Tariffs on Canadian Pork
China said it is going to reduce tariffs on pork, including from Canada and the United States.
Pork is within a package of 853 goods on which China is cutting tariffs.
China said the reduced tariff rates will be lower than Most-Favoured-Nation rates.
The tariff cuts “facilitate the open economy to a new level,” China’s Ministry of Finance said in a statement that has been reported by Bloomberg news service.
China’s move comes separate from, but just before, a trade deal with the United States is due to be signed.
Under that deal, China is going to commit to buy up to $50 million worth of agricultural products from the U.S.
In the U.S., the National Pork Producers Council said cutting the tariff on pork could lead to $25 billion worth of pork exports to China. •
— By Jim Romahn

Pork Packers Enjoying Profits
Pork packers are making a lot of money this past December.
Export demand, mainly from China, has allowed packers to increase pork prices.
On the supply side, there are so many hogs coming to market that there is barely enough capacity to slaughter them all.
Normally that would depress hog prices, but packers are making such good margins that they are willing to buy all the hogs farmers are shipping. Margins now are more than 13 per cent better than a year ago.
The United States has been a major beneficiary so far with pork exports increasing by 12 per cent in November. Canada is poised to start catching up now that China has lifted its ban on Canadian beef and pork.
That ban went into effect when more than 170 falsified export certificates were identified. • — By Jim Romahn

Computer Modelling Predicts Next PED Outbreaks
The Executive Director of the Swine Health Information Center reports it’s now possible to use the swine health information being provided voluntarily by swine producers to predict when a farm can be expected to break with PED.
The Swine Health Information Center’s January 2020 Newsletter includes a summary of the center’s 2019 results.
Speaking to Farmscape, Dr Paul Sundberg, the Executive Director of the Swine Health Information Center, says, in the area of preparedness, the use of computer modelling is now providing a new way to look at data analysis.
“We’re now able to use a computer learning process, and now the beta test, of being able to predict two weeks in advance when a farm is at risk and will be breaking with PED [porcine epidemic diarrhea].”
Using the information available from the sources of producers that are willing to share information, our models have been able to go back in time and successfully predict when a farm would break and now, we’re using that as a way to predict.
“And we’ll be looking forward in real time now to model and test out the process for being able to predict when a farm is going to break with PED in order to enable communication and action on the farm to mitigate that outbreak.”
“I think that’s a significant step that we’re to the show now that the shared data that producers are willing to offer up can be used to predict when they’re going to have a disease outbreak and that way, they can better make sure that they’re prepared and perhaps prevent it.” •

— The Pig Site

Pig Virus Can Jump to Birds, Spread Fast
Researchers have found that a pig virus can spread to birds and then quite rapidly to other birds.
It could be very bad news for owners of commercial flocks because they could all go down fast if the pig virus gets into the flock.
“We weren’t even sure the virus would transmit from bird to bird. That’s a significant finding,” said senior author Scott Kenney, assistant professor of veterinary preventive medicine based in Ohio State’s Food Animal Health Research Program at the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center (OARDC).
“It looks like it’s pretty readily able to spread between birds. It’s a little concerning because if the virus gets into one or two animals in a large layer or broiler house, it would probably permeate through the entire house pretty quickly,” Kenney said.
According to the researchers, porcine deltacoronavirus was first detected in pigs in Asia in 2009 and caused a swine diarrhea outbreak in the United States in 2014. Deltacoronaviruses historically have been linked to birds, and scientists suspect that this porcine virus originated in an avian species.•
— By Jim Romahn

Feds Seek Advertisers for Buy Canadian Campaign
The federal government is inviting proposals for a five-year campaign to persuade people to consume more Canadian-produced foods.
The government said it is budgeting between $1.5 and $4 million per year for five years.
It wants promotion that tugs at emotions and with some emphasis on women, seniors and Indigenous peoples.
“The campaign should tell the story of Canada’s agri-food sector and reach audiences on an emotional level in order to instil pride and confidence in the country’s food systems,” the notice of the contract states under a section outlining the goals of the project.
The campaign is for both Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. •
— By Jim Romahn

Details of U.S.-China Trade Deal Revealed
Details of the Phase One trade deal between the United States and China were revealed after the signing recently in Washington.
They fit within the context of a Chinese promise to buy more agricultural products from the U.S.
PORK
• Expand the allowable product scope for U.S. pork and pork products, including bungs and intestines and processed products.
ALL MEAT, PORK AND POULTRY
• Address the backlog of facilities awaiting approval and accelerate the process for future applicants by publishing within 20 business days of receipt the updated list of USDA-approved facilities;
• Permit, consistent with USDA directives, the use of replacement certificates;
• Begin utilizing USDA’s Public Health Information System to facilitate the use of electronic transmission of export health certificates, greatly reducing the workload for exporters and regulators; and
• Conduct as soon as possible a risk assessment for ractopamine in cattle and swine, consistent with Codex Alimentarius Commission and FAO/WHO Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) risk assessment guidance based on a previously conducted JECFA risk assessment. •
— By Jim Romahn

Chinese Farmers Get ASF Compensation
Hog farmers in Hunan province in China have been given more than $300 million in compensation for losses connected with African Swine Fever.
The compensation was paid to about 467,000 farmers in the province where close to 25 per cent of pigs were either killed by African Swine Fever or culled to prevent spread to more farms.
The government said the compensation is intended to help the farmers to resume hog production. •
— By Jim Romahn

Survey Finds Canadians Wish to Eat Less Meat
The Meatless Farm Co. hired Angus Reid to conduct a survey that – surprise! surprise! – found that 43 per cent of Canadians would eat plant-based imitation meats to help the environment.
The survey also found that 77 per cent of Canadians say they understand the “damaging environmental impact of eating red.”
Yet only 38 per cent said they reduced meat consumption in order to reduce their impact on the environment.
The Meatless Farm claims that switching to one plant-based meal a week would reduce greenhouse gas by five per cent a year and if every Canadian did it, national carbon dioxide emissions would be reduced by 30 million tonnes That’s similar to emissions from six million cars.
It would also reduce agricultural land use by 10 million hectares the Meatless Farm said. The company, based in the United Kingdom, makes hamburgers from plant proteins.
The survey found that “one-third of consumers are making a resolution to reduce meat consumption in 2020 (33 per cent) and another third (36 per cent) expect to buy more plant-based products in the new year.”
Younger people are more interested in switching. More than half of those between ages 18 and 24 expect to increase consumption of plant-based items compared with 34 for those between ages There are some concerns. For example, 58 per cent feel the ersatz meats will not taste as good, and 39 per cent say it will cost more.
The Meatless Farm says attitudes are formed in homes, so is encouraging parents to educate their children and prepare one or two meatless meals per week. •
— By Jim Romahn

Canadians Using American One Health Protocol
A One Health Certified program developed in the United States is being used by a Canadian team of researchers to delve into antibiotic resistance and its impact on disease prevention, veterinary care, responsible antibiotic use, animal welfare and the environment.
The Canadian team involves people from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC), the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), and Health Canada
In the U.S. the program is administered by the National Institute of Antimicrobial Resistance Research and Education (NIAMRRE).
The benefit for those who follow the protocols is certification that is a demonstration to the public that they are farming and processing food responsibly.
“Antimicrobial resistance is a real problem for human health, for public health,” Dr. Ed Topp, research scientist at AAFC and project coordinator, said in an interview with Farms.com.
“The majority of antibiotics (used in Canada) are used in food animal production,” Topp said.
“There’s concern that there’s development of resistance in these production systems and then people are exposed to these new resistant bacteria through consumption of meat or through exposure to contaminated environments,” he said. •
— By Jim Romahn

Rise of Yeast Bioactives Expands the Toolbox for Livestock Operators
Canadian Bio-Systems receives Veterinary Health Products approval for Maxi-Nutrio® Liquid. An innovative new category of science-powered yeast technology, with dynamic potential to benefit livestock operations, is gaining expanded opportunity for 2020 – delivering strong advantages to optimize profitability while aligning with antibiotic-reduction and sustainability trends.
Yeast Bioactives technology developed by Canadian Bio-Systems Inc. (CBS Inc.) is designed for use as a supplement in diets for poultry, swine and ruminants. It offers broad benefits as a bio-based, production-enhancing technology that meets new industry standards and marketplace expectations – giving producers a much-needed new option in the toolbox.
Following last year’s introduction, Yeast Bioactives has been the focus of ongoing rapid market expansion. CBS Inc. has now announced broadened availability for 2020, including in a brand new liquid formulation for use in water. The company recently received Veterinary Health Products approval in Canada for the new Maxi-Nutrio® Liquid, one of several products featuring the proprietary Yeast Bioactives technology.
Yeast Bioactives technology is based on multiple years of discovery research by CBS Inc. in partnership with the novel feed technology research program led by Dr. Bogdan Slominski at the University of Manitoba. This research has shown properties and activities that help to mitigate a number of potential threats that can undermine feed quality, animal performance, animal health and food safety.
Yeast Bioactives technology used in feed or water also serves an invaluable role in supporting transition to and maintenance of reduced antimicrobial and RWA (raised without antibiotics) systems. •

PEDv in Alberta
***At press time there was a confirmed weak environmental positive test for PEDv
A sample collected by Alberta’s swine disease surveillance program has tested weak environmental positive for porcine epidemic diarrhea (PED) virus. The sample was taken from a location in Alberta and analyzed at Alberta Agriculture and Forestry’s laboratory on January 22, 2020.
Alberta Pork is working closely with Alberta Agriculture and Forestry to mitigate any risks of potential disease exposure. Any producers or industry partners directly affected by this discovery have been notified, and all relevant parties are cooperating with Alberta Pork and Alberta Agriculture and Forestry.
Strict biosecurity protocols are of utmost importance in limiting the impact of disease in agriculture. It is critical that producers and industry partners remain vigilant. Always practice proper biosecurity on-farm and during animal transportation. Be sure to properly wash transport trailers and equipment, and submit all swine manifests, including farm-to-farm movements, to Alberta Pork in a timely manner. Biosecurity and traceability are important parts of effective disease prevention.
PED virus is a disease that causes diarrhea and vomiting in pigs. The virus affects pigs but poses no risk to human health. This incident has not caused any food safety concerns, and pork products remain safe for consumption. Alberta Pork will communicate any further updates if needed.
If you have any questions or concerns, contact Javier Bahamon, Quality Assurance and Production Manager, Alberta Pork by email at javier.bahamon@albertapork.com or Cristina Neva, Quality Assurance and Production Specialist, Alberta Pork by email at cristina.neva@albertapork.com. •