Feed costs hurt Canadian hog producers

(Resource News International) — High feed grain prices are causing some
concern for western Canadian hog producers, who are losing
money and sending more animals to the U.S. to be fed as a
result.

“Feed grain costs are the highest they’ve ever been,”
said Neil Ketilson, general manager of Sask Pork. He estimated
that the cost of feeding a hog in Saskatchewan was roughly $40 above what producers were actually seeing for their finished animals.

Ketilson said those hog producers that also grow grain

Read Also

Klassen: Lower feed grain prices set to enhance feeder cattle prices

For the week ending July 19, Western Canadian feeder cattle markets were unchanged from the previous week, although volumes were limited.

were taking a loss on their grain and feeding it to their
animals in order to subsidize their operations.

Other
larger producers are sending more and more animals to the U.S.,
he said, estimating that upward of 50 per cent of the province’s
weanlings could eventually move to the U.S.

Ketilson said the feed situation was unlikely to change
until another crop was in the ground next spring. In the
meantime, he said, many producers were worried about how they
will survive.

“We’re bunkering down for a really difficult winter,” he said.

Karl Kynoch, chair of the Manitoba Pork Council, said
producers were operating in the red a lot sooner in the year

than normal, as high feed costs, together with the strong
Canadian dollar, were creating challenges for the hog sector.

“It will be really tough for a lot of producers to hang
on right now,” said Kynoch, adding that many Manitoba producers
were shutting down their finishing barns and instead shipping
more weanlings down to the U.S.

“It’s cheaper to haul little
pigs down to where the main source of feed grain is than to
bring the grain up,” he commented.

Kynoch thought the issue wasn’t so much the high cost of
feed, but rather the low returns for slaughter hogs.

Ketilson agreed that the returns to Canadian hog
producers need to increase. However, he pointed out, U.S.
producers are still breaking even and the overall market is
unlikely to see a shift until U.S. hog producers start losing
money as well.