Define Your Message: South Dakota Shareholders Offer Talking Points
July 19, 2010
If you were asked to provide your own rebuttal to accusations against pork producers, how would you respond? We put the question to these South Dakota shareholders.
Swine Line: The term “factory farm” gets bandied about these days. What would you say to someone who mistakenly puts that label on your family operation?
Linda Jones: I’d tell people ours is not a factory farm because we own each pig. And we take care of them with compassion. Even though there are thousands of pigs, we pay attention to each one, walking through the pens every day to check on their health and comfort.
Larry Klumb: I hate the idea of someone thinking our operation is a factory farm. Yes, this farm isn’t the same as it was 30 years ago, but the reason we’ve grown is to include our two sons at the table and support their families. If our buildings seem larger, it’s because we need more dollars coming in to match the dollars going out for our expenses.
Swine Line: What about concerns that there is something sinister going on behind the doors of your barns? What would you like every neighbor and every animal-welfare activist to know about the way you treat your animals?
Linda: I’d want them to understand how much more comfortable the pigs are inside in a controlled environment. We had eight inches of rain in the Mitchell (SD) area recently. I wish everyone could understand what it would be like for our pigs to live outdoors in that much mud. And what about during a snow storm? An old-style open building doesn’t provide much shelter once it’s covered by a snow bank!
And what about South Dakota heat? Sprinkler hoses can’t cool a full-grown sow when the temperature hits 102°. She wouldn’t survive outdoors! But in our shareholder-owned sow barn, she’s cooled by fans. That’s true compassion for animals.
Larry: I wish could take animal activists on a walk back through time—back across my life as a pork producer. I think then they’d realize we’re so much more animalfriendly than hog production even 30 years ago.
I wish they could go all the way back to the 1950s and early ’60s when I was a little guy. My dad and grandpa kept pigs on three or four acres where there were hog wallows—big mud holes that filled up with rainwater and manure and smelled so bad! Every day between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m., it was a battle—not a friendly game of king of the mountain, but a battle—to see which pig got the coolest spot. You could hear the screaming. Naturally, the strongest pig got the best place!
They lived all day in this ugliness where nothing should live. Then when it turned cooler they went inside, covered with all that muck and tried to rub it off on the barn walls. Naturally, the building filled with dust. As a kid, I could be inside our hog barn and not be able to see my dad and grandpa through the clouds of dust. How can that be a good environment?
Now, as Linda points out, when it gets hot in our buildings, fans and misters come on. Our pigs have better protection against heat than some of the people living in Mitchell, SD! It’s absolutely beautiful in our barns, and I wish everyone could understand the evolution. I’d swear on a Bible we’re much more animal-friendly than when pigs were raised outdoors.
Certification Offers the Consumer Peace of Mind
Swine Line: Pork industry organizations back PQA Plus, TQA, and We Care® as a means of reassuring consumers that producers are meeting the best animal welfare standards. What should consumers know about your compliance to these standards?
Linda: I’d want consumers to know we are compliant. We are PQA Plus certified and our haulers are TQA certified. But I’d also want to assure shoppers and advocates that we didn’t need these guidelines to set our values. We were already doing everything described in PQA Plus!
Oh, maybe I did change one thing: After PQA Plus training, I posted signs on our buildings in case someone needed to get in touch with us in an emergency. But overall, the point of PQA Plus is not to teach us how to care for livestock; it’s meant to provide peace of mind for consumers.
In addition, we make the extra effort to keep our confinement facilities clean and looking good for people who drive by. We add stuff to the manure pits to limit odor, and we’ve built a compost building, which also helps control any smell.
Larry: We didn’t do anything new as a result of PQA Plus. We didn’t need to be told how to treat animals; it’s something you just know if you grow up on a family farm. When I was maybe two years old, my grandma taught me that you don’t kick a dog or a pig. I want consumers to understand how well I learned that lesson!
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