By Warwick Long from Shepparton 3630
Tuesday, 27/07/2010
Do sow stalls have a future in Australian piggeries?
Sow stalls are a controversial management technique in piggeries, where pigs are housed in individual pens that don't allow the pig to turn around.
Animal welfare groups say they are cruel and should be banned.
Supermarket giant Coles has taken that step, and will ban selling pork products sourced from piggeries using sow stalls
But Victorian Farmers Federation Pig group president John Bourke says the ban is hypocritical because it only applies to meat products from Australian farmers.
He says the supermarket has a hidden agenda and that is to get fresh pork imports into the country allowed.
At the moment only cured or cooked pork products such as bacon and ham off the bone from other countries are allowed into Australia.
Mr Bourke says if fresh pork was allowed into Australia, exotic disease would come as well, which would decimate all livestock industries in this country.
The Australian pork industry would collapse because overseas countries can produce pork a lot cheaper then Australian farmers.
Denmark, Canada and other countries that supply meat to Coles use sow stalls as part of management practice.
The industry is already 60,000 sows smaller after importation of ham, bacon and other pork products was allowed from North America.
He says that animal welfare is not a priority for the giant supermarket.
"Coles couldn't give a bugger about sow stalls; they don't know what animal welfare means."
It is not the first time the debate over the use of sow stalls has hit the headlines.
Recently Tasmania has banned the use of practice, but overseas they have been banned in some places for a longer period -sow stalls have been banned in the United Kingdom for some time.
Steve Hawke, a production manager at a property in Northern Victoria, began his career in the UK, but it was a very different pig industry then.
He says it was a big industry and a good career when he started in the 80s.
Sow stalls were banned in the 90s which led to increased imports from other countries and the English industry shrunk.
"It is basically a cottage industry now."
Mr Hawke says an irony of the debate is that the RSPCA was part of the process to introduce sow stalls, and now animal welfare groups are campaigning to stop their use.Sow stalls were invented as an animal welfare tool to stop pigs from bullying each other.
Animal welfare groups say it is cruel to keep animals in such a confined space in which the pig can't turn around or walk more then a few steps.
Alternatives to sow stall exist: farmers can grow free-range pork or in production piggeries; small group pens and barn-type penning is already used by pig farmers.
For many piggery owners already battling low prices, the cost of changing from sow stall management to alternative forms of management is prohibitive.
At John Bourke's property in northern Victoria, the farm is already set up with multiple management techniques.
Sow stalls are just a three-week part of the pigs breeding cycle, group pens and barn-style housing make up the rest of the cycle.
He says he could change, but the cost is prohibitive.
"It won't be hard to (change) no, but it is going to be costly."
"Who wants to pay - are the green people going to pay?"
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