Descriptive study of production factors affecting performance traits in growing-finishing pigs in Spain

Abstract

The objective of this study was to build up a data set including productive performance and production factors data of growing-finishing (GF) pigs in Spain in order to perform a representative and reliable description of the traits of Spanish growing-finishing pig industry. Data from 764 batches from 452 farms belonging to nine companies (1,157,212 pigs) were collected between 2008 and 2010 through a survey including five parts: general, facilities, feeding, health status and performance. Most studied farms had only GF pigs on their facilities (94.7%), produced ‘industrial’ pigs (86.7%), had entire male and female (59.5%) and Pietrain-sired pigs (70.0%), housed between 13-20 pigs per pen (87.2%), had  50% of slatted floor (70%), single-space dry feeder (54.0%), nipple drinker (88.7%) and automatic ventilation systems (71.2%). A 75.0% of the farms used three feeding phases using mainly pelleted diets (91.0%), 61.3% performed three or more antibiotic treatments and 36.5% obtained water from the public supply. Continuous variables studied had the following average values: number of pigs placed per batch, 1,515 pigs; initial and final body weight, 19.0 and 108 kg; length of GF period, 136 days; culling rate, 1.4%; barn occupation, 99.7%; feed intake per pig and fattening cycle, 244 kg; daily gain, 0.657 kg; feed conversion ratio, 2.77 kg kg-1 and mortality rate, 4.3%. Data reflecting the practical situation of the Spanish growing and finishing pig production and it may contribute to develop new strategies in order to improve the productive and economic efficiency of GF pig units.