The Urgent Need to Combat Productivity-Reducing Diseases in Pig Farming

[축산신문 김영길 기자]

Pig farm PRRS positive rate 80% ‘widespread’
Serco, Maiko, PED, etc. are also severely damaged
Concern about “more scary than ASF”
“Active vaccine response, effective solution

Pig production in Korea is still low. Compared to developed countries in pig farming, Korea is far behind in production indicators such as MSY (yearly number of pigs shipped per sow).
Considering the domestic market where imported pork is pushing in, it is not something to be left alone.
You have to somehow increase your productivity. We need to enhance our global competitiveness.
Regarding this, many experts diagnose that the urgent priority is to solve productivity-reducing diseases such as Circo, Myco, PRRS, and PED.
In addition, it is a disaster that is bigger than catastrophic malignant diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) and African swine fever (ASF), and advises that we need to be more proactive in solving diseases that reduce productivity.
As such, productivity-reducing diseases are prevalent in domestic pig farms and cause a lot of damage.
For example, in the case of PRRS, it is difficult to find clean pig farms. According to one survey, the positive rate of PRRS is as high as 80%.
The damage is serious. In sows, it causes abortion, premature birth, and a decrease in the number of live births, and in piglets, it causes a decrease in feed efficiency, delayed shipment, and mortality.
The situation is not much different for other productivity-reducing diseases such as circo, myco, and PED.
It is not the only disease of reduced productivity. Swine influenza, mycotoxin, and pleural pneumonia are also threatening pig farms.
Fortunately, however, we have a weapon called a vaccine.
For example, Circo vaccine is faithfully fulfilling its role as a ‘shield’ from Circo disease, the thief of productivity.
If it is said that domestic pig farming productivity is improving little by little, Circo vaccine is always mentioned as one of the contributors.
Vaccine activity in other diseases is also great.
In particular, recently, it is contributing to solving the problem of eyelid disease amid technological competition, such as cutting-edge technology, loading mutant strains, and strategies tailored to farm families.
Vaccines that maximize convenience, such as mixed vaccines, mixed vaccines, and intradermal inoculation, are relieving farm households’ concerns such as labor.
However, it is regrettable that foreign vaccines are dominating the net exhaust vaccine market, except for PED vaccines.
Domestic companies have no intention of backing down like this. We are concentrating our efforts on developing a new vaccine that will turn the tide of the battle.
I am already curious about what products will be released and how the competition with foreign products will flow.
It is hoped that this special feature will arouse interest in productivity-reducing diseases, prepare more efficient countermeasures, and contribute to minimizing damage to farms.

Livestock Newspaper, CHUKSANNEWS