The Saskatchewan Pork Development Board reports just over 40 of the province’s pork producers have participated in the federal Cull Breeding Swine Program and, by the time it wraps up, will have reduced the province’s total breeding herd by about ten percent. Introduced in April, the cull breeding swine program was developed by the federal government to reduce Canada’s breeding herd.
To avoid market disruptions meat from animals culled under program may not enter the commercial food distribution chain but it is allowed to be donated for use by food banks. Saskatchewan Pork Development Board policy analyst Mark Ferguson says, once the final numbers have been crunched, the cost of processing donated animals will be close to the 440 thousand dollars budgeted by the province.
Source:
Farmscape.ca, August 28, 2008 (Episode 2946)