An inventory of pig production systems in Europe

The present study was conducted within the EU-supported project Q-Porkchains. A total of 84 production systems were identified in 23 European countries; Forty are conventional (CS) and 44 claim to be differentiated (DS) on Eating Quality (EQ 70%), Animal Welfare (AW 68%), Environment (EV 41%), Local (LO 30%), Nutritional Quality (NQ 25%), Organic (OR 25%). DS are much smaller (Min-Mean-Max million pigs/y: DS 0.01-1.0-12; CS 0.5-5.3-40). Compared to systems differentiated on other claims: (1) in EQ-DS, orientation towards high quality market segment, fatteners outdoors or on non slatted floor, pure or local breeds are more frequent. Farmer-related QA systems and label/brands are less common.Technical performance is lower, carcasses are heavier and fatter. (2) in AW-DS, sows and piglets outdoors or on non-slatted floor, specific welfare rules and keeping sows loose are more frequent. Mortality rates of growing pigs and sows are higher. (3) in EV-DS, pigs outdoors or on non-slatted floor, solid manure are more frequent. Treating manure is less common. Lower technical performance and extra constraints result in higher production costs that are hardly compensated by higher selling prices. (4) in NQ-DS, the more common use of label/brands and QA systems is not reflected in selling prices that are little higher and do not compensate for higher production costs. (5) in OR-DS, pigs outdoors or on non-slatted floor, keeping sows loose, solid manure, specific welfare rules are more frequent. Treating manure is less frequent. Mortality rates of piglets and weaners are higher. Further work is currently ongoing within the Q-Porkchains project to investigate the sustainability of 15 contrasting production systems in Denmark, France, Netherlands, Spain and UK (one CS and two DS in each country).