Pig producers in Wales can now benchmark their business’ performance using a free programme developed by the sector.
Designed for all types of pig enterprises, the bi-lingual ‘Measure to Manage’ programme enables pig producers – small or large-scale – to analyse their business performance.
Developed by industry bodies Menter Moch Cymru and Farming Connect, it allows farmers to benchmark their business by recording their inputs, outputs, and herd performance over a set period.
It analyses the data based on targets and key performance indicators (KPIs) such as stock numbers and valuation, purchases and sales, performance data and running costs.
For breeding herds, the KPIs include farrowing rates, non-productive days, or the number of piglets born, weaned and sold.
The finisher section analysis includes daily live weight gain, average days to finish and feed conversion ratio.
The data can be used to provide a year-on-year comparison, or compared anonymously against other pig enterprises, to help identify a business’s strengths and weaknesses.
Menter Moch Cymru development officer, Lauren Smith, said it was a useful tool for keeping on top of the cost of keeping pigs and the output at the end.
"Keeping on top of costs is crucial to running a profitable pig enterprise, especially at a time when input costs are high, as if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.”
Menter Moch Cymru has also designed a data collection book to help producers to input the data into the Measure to Manage programme.
