Importance of Traceability on Swine Farms

Introduction

Swine producers continue to face the ever growing threat of Foreign Animal Disease. Specifically, African Swine Fever has been a topic of discussion for several years. The impact of a Foreign Animal Disease outbreak in the United States threatens the entire pork industry. A single detection in the United States would immediately stop United States pork exports. A 2023 Iowa State University study predicted the economic impact of an African Swine Fever outbreak would result in economic losses of 79.5 billion dollars over 10 years including, a loss of 60,000 jobs and a price drop received by swine producers of 50% to 60%. That’s why it is highly important to review pre-harvest traceability. Improving the way we track live pig movements will help control disease spread and ensure we can continue to provide safe, healthy pork to the world.

A single detection (of African Swine Fever) in the United States would immediately stop United States pork exports.

Traceability

Traceability is another pillar in an overall Foreign Animal Disease preparedness plan. Being part of a farm’s biosecurity plan, traceability supports disease management and allows efficient and accurate tracing of live animal movements. There are an estimated one million movements of swine every day in the US. This information allows us to know where diseased animals are located, identify at-risk animals, and where they have been. The ability to quickly regionalize an outbreak and segregate affected areas from disease-free areas will ensure to United States trading partners that animal products are not from affected farms. This regionalization, established by the World Organization for Animal Health, enables a country with a disease outbreak to export products from areas shown to be disease-free. The ability to recognize a state or group of states that are not affected will enable the state or states to resume exports to US trading partners, resulting in business continuity and dramatically reduce negative economic impacts.

Swine producers’ responsibilities are to be able to provide the last 30 days of swine movement in electronic format to their state’s State Animal Health Organization (SAHO). The information would provide the following:

• Farms Premises Identification Number (PIN)
• Number of Animals
• Size and type of animal being moved

AgView

The AgView program available to swine producers allows accurate and secure storage of required information. The AgView application is available free of charge to swine producers from the National Pork Board. AgView is a contact-tracing platform to help mitigate the spread and damage caused by a potential foreign animal disease outbreak in the U.S. swine herd. When permissioned by producer-users, AgView can provide real-time health status plus site and pig movement data from participating farms to state animal health officials. This information will aid in the response to a suspected or confirmed foreign animal disease. These features could help the pork industry rapidly contain or regionalize a potential foreign animal disease outbreak. AgView uses much of the same data required by participants in the nation’s Secure Pork Supply plan but connects the dots and leverages the information for actionable intelligence in a manner allowing state veterinarians, producers, and others to make sound decisions quickly.

Summary

Traceability is vitally important to continuing to prepare for a foreign animal disease outbreak in addition to a farm’s biosecurity plan, no matter how big or small.

Connect with Jeff Morris

Your Swine Outreach Specialist, Jeff Morris, is available to assist you in developing a herd biosecurity plan and specifically developing a way to track pig movement.

Jeff can be reached at jeff.morris@wisc.edu or 608-346-9561

Reviewed by:
Carolyn Ihde
Small Ruminant Outreach Specialist
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Division of Extension

Steve Okonek
Regional Educator
Jackson & Trempealeau Counties
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Division of Extension