The true value of an empty farrowing place

We were once told “all you have to do to be successful at pig farming is keep the farm full”.

While easily said, it has proven, at times, to be difficult to achieve.

The major reason for failure to keep the farm full has been batches with empty farrowing places. But what is the value of an empty farrowing place?

Is this a disaster or an opportunity?

The value of an empty farrowing place:

Using the value of the meat not sold

With 11.5 pigs weaned per farrowing place (many countries are weaning 12!) and 80 kg dead-weight per pig sold this is 920 kg of meat (assuming they all finished).

With a cost of production of £1.32 and an income of £1.45 – this results in a loss of £119.60

Incorrect

The calculation takes no account of the fixed costs that have to be paid even when these pigs are not born.

Taking into account costs involved in pig farming

The “fixed” costs, the non-feed costs, need to be paid whether these 11.5 pigs are alive or dead.

With feed costs around 65% - the remaining 35% can be considered “fixed”.

Therefore these costs are £0.46p per kilogram. This then accounts for £425.04 per farrowing place. When these are combined with the loss of income we arrive at £544.64 as the loss of profit for each farrowing place empty per batch – true disaster!

The failure to capture these 11.5 pigs sold is devastating to the farm as they represent the “marginal” pigs over cost and would have been the most profitable pigs.

Because these pigs were not sold – the true cost of production for the remainder has increased – from the £1.32 per kg dead-weight to £1.37 per kg dead-weight

an increase in £4.32 per pig sold!

Our example farm has 10 farrowing places per batch

Graph demonstrating the profit with percentage of pigs sold

The red line indicates zero profit line.

On our example farm, it is required to sell a minium of 86 pigs per batch just to break-even.

The profit per pig over the 86 pigs can be calculated and graphed.

Profit per pig sold

The graph clearly demonstrates the missed opportunity of the empty farrowing place – which on this farm represents 10% of the farm’s output. Note with 2 empty farrowing places we automatically make a loss!

What are the other consequences of an empty farrowing place?

Pre-weaning mortality

This is a figure that is regularly misused by the industry.

The pre-weaning mortality should be a judgment of the number of pigs which died before weaning – for any reason.

On our example farm – 115 pigs are targeted to be weaned per batch.

With a typical 10% pre-weaning mortality and 1% born dead – a total born target of12.9 is required.

If one farrowing place is empty and the farm preforms as normal –as only 103 pigs were weaned the true pre-weaning mortality increases to 19% for this batch.

Pre-weaning mortality should include all pigs pre-weaning which failed to farrow. Those which were not conceived, died as embryo’s or were aborted – should all be included – they failed to live to weaning.

Finishing rate

Rather than consider mortality all the time, we prefer to consider the good side of farming – the number of pigs which were finished.

Thus a 95% finishing rate is the same as a 5% post-weaning mortality.

What effect has the empty farrowing place on finishing rate?

Target sales per batch would be 95% of 115 weaners or 8800 kg dead-weight or 110 finishing pigs.

With one empty farrowing place and target performance, the batch would only produce 7480 kg dead-weight or 98 pigs sold a true finishing rate of only 85% - equivalent of 15% post-weaning mortality!

(Readers will note that with 11.5 weaned the numbers above have been rounded to whole pigs).

Reproductive impact

To produce a stable pig flow, the weaned sow represent 80% of the future batch breeding target. An empty farrowing place need to be filled at weaning with at least 2 gilts as the breeding capacity of a gilt is 10% less than a weaned sow. Failure to achieve this results in the characteristic uneven flow seen on many farms – resulting in another empty farrowing place in 21 weeks’ time.

Summary

The impact of an empty farrowing place:

On an example farm of 10 farrowing places per batch, weaning 11.5 pigs per farrowing place.

Cost of production £1.32 per kg deadweight with an income of £1.45 per kg deadweight:

An empty farrowing place results in:

1. Need for extra gilts to maintain batch breeding targets
2. Decrease in the finishing rate to 85% (15% post-weaning mortality)
3. Increase in pre-weaning mortality to 19%
4. Increase in cost of production by £4.32 per pig sold
5. Decrease of £544.64 in profits

Conclusion

An empty farrowing place: A disaster or an opportunity?

Answer: A disaster of mega proportions