Have you noticed lately that it is almost impossible to pick up the business section of the paper or listen to a financial report and not hear that some recent acquisition, merger or strategic alliance has been formed? Ever consider what is behind these actions that characterizes the business climate of the 1990's? Increased competition, large capital outlay, rising costs and narrow profit margins are a few reasons that come to mind. Businesses today are finding their future profit in maximizing efficiencies and expanding their markets.

Production Efficiency and Herd Health
The dairy industry is undergoing a similar change. Narrow profit margins are slowly squeezing smaller players out, and those who stay are forced to consolidate with others or expand to produce a profit. What does this have to do with biosecurity? Production efficiencies are directly related to the health of the herd. Biosecurity is the part of your management program that protects herd health, allowing production to reach its highest genetic potential, and at the same time reduces risk.

No other livestock enterprise has more aggressively and visibly embraced biosecurity than the swine industry. When was the last time you just wandered onto a major swine raising facility? Today, as part of their biosecurity program swine producers limit visitor access. Many concepts regarding the spread of disease, disease control or eradication, and herd health are similar on both dairies and swine facilities. 

Table 1 lists the common biosecurity measures taken by many swine operations, and represents the major biosecurity focal points as embraced by the swine industry. Some measures are identical to recommended dairy procedures and have been covered in previous articles in this series.

Restricting Visitor Access
While many producers judge the success of their calf raising by the percentage of those that survive to weaning, a better measure of success might be to consider the growth rates of the calves. In the case of replacement heifers, growth rate ultimately affects the timing of puberty, which affects the age of first lactation (24 months vs.28 months), and even first lactation milk production.

When the age of first lactation and milk production come into the picture, the economic impact of calfhood diseases takes on a new meaning. While no uniform data is available, it is generally recognized that calf diseases ultimately set the calf back in regard to growth rate and often create chronic conditions that will never allow the animal to reach its full genetic potential. These previously sick (but recovered) calves may lag behind healthy herdmates by weeks or even months. In addition, if their illness was severe enough or long standing, permanent damage and/or chronic pain may be present which will ultimately results in these animals becoming economic liabilities. 

All-In-All-Out (AIAO) Flow
All-in-all-out refers to a management system in which animals are segregated by age and moved in groups from one production phase to the next. This method helps decrease disease transmission by preventing older residents from passing disease to new, usually younger, arrivals. It also allows for complete cleaning and disinfection of facilities during the unoccupied phase of the all-in-all-out system.

This system has had a positive effect on profitability for the pork producer. One source estimated an improvement of 7-10% in average daily gain and a 14-28 day improvement in days to market. Another source placed feed savings at as much at $2.40/hog (assuming $.08/lb feed cost). Such gains translate into significant profits for producers. 

The opposite of the AIAO management system would be a continuous flow system, which is found on most dairies. Young stock are moved individually or in small groups, and then allowed to commingle with present animals. While the concept of AIAO may not be practical for many smaller dairies, it could find application in the raising of calves and replacement heifers. All too often younger animals pick up disease pathogens from current residents or from the surrounding environment.

The economic application for dairies lies in the value of getting heifers bred and into lactation no later than 24 months of age. Just as healthy, disease-free hogs put on better weight gains, healthy, disease-free calves and heifers grow faster and ultimately enter into lactation weeks or even months ahead of their counterparts who had to battle illness.

Ongoing Disease Surveillance and Monitoring
This represents another area of biosecurity in which swine producers excel. Not only do many swine operators test and quarantine all incoming livestock, but they periodically test animals to make sure no new disease problems have gained a foothold.

In addition to routine surveillance, pork producers are aggressive in performing 'slaughter checks' where a certain percentage of hogs going to slaughter are essentially given a post-mortem examination. An exam with diagnostic laboratory backup can offer more information about the success of a herd health program or the possibility of a new disease trend than any other single tool.

While dairy producers are not in the business of sending animals to slaughter, this does not preclude the use of post-mortem examinations to monitor the health trends of the herd. Do you ever have a cow or heifer die without knowing exactly why? Even if you know the cause of death, other information may be gathered, such as internal parasite levels, presence of pathogenic bacteria, fatty livers, nutritional deficiencies, chronic pneumonia lesions, etc. Many producers see this as an additional expense and figure that a loss has already occurred -- why increase it?

Dairy producers should be encouraged to become more aggressive in the monitoring of disease and not have animals die, abort, or get scours without knowing why or what is going on. If you knew exactly why every cow or calf died, or what was behind every abortion or open cow, what kind of advantage do you think you would have in preventing its reoccurrence? What kind of economic return could be generated by an aggressive monitoring program on the average dairy? The potential profits could be huge.

Pictured here, Dr. Gregory Quakenbush, D.V.M,.Technical Services, Pfizer Animal Health

Vigilance. Rigorous enforcement of the above practices has led to decreased incidence of disease on numerous hog operations. A biosecurity program is only as good as the producer's willingness to stick by it. Adopting the above list of measures does no good if they are enforced only when convenient. Biosecurity measures have to be practiced all the time.

National Backing. These biosecurity measures come from the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC). This group represents producers at every level and they have the common goal of improving the quality and reputation of pork production.

Quality. Biosecurity is tied to quality. The NPPC implemented another successful program known as Pork Quality Assurance (PQA). It encourages producers to improve the quality of their product by improving the means by which they raise it. Attaining the top level (Level III) certification requires producers to implement a number of practices, as well as to strictly adhere to prescribed biosecurity measures. PQA has gone a long way in making pork producers more profitable, and the final product more appealing to consumers. 

Pictured here, Dr. Victor Cortese, D.V.M,.Technical Services, Pfizer Animal Health

Economics. Any program that does not contribute to the profitability of the operation will likely be ignored by producers. Pork producers, like dairy producers, operate on narrow profit margins. Biosecurity measures decrease disease incidence and improve profitability by reducing expenses for medications.

Consumer Perception. Although consumers are several steps removed from the production phase of pork, they are acutely aware and sensitive to food safety issues. Anything producers can do to shed the image that livestock production is a dirty, disease-ridden process goes a long way toward improving consumer attitudes about meat and its production.

Summary
Although not every biosecurity measure adopted by progressive pork producers is applicable to the dairy producer, there are some concepts which could easily have some application in the dairy herd health program. Both the swine and the dairy producers have undergone a lot of changes in recent years, and both share tight profit margins and serve customers who demand high quality and healthy products for their families. Producers of all livestock operations will be well served to make biosecurity a cornerstone of their overall management program.

Jack Wiley is a freelance technical writer in Lee’s Summit, Missouri.