Historically, pork production has been an important sector of the agricultural industry, contributing millions of dollars to provincial economies. The Maritime Pork Industry, small in scale by national standards; generates economic benefit through employment, feed & input sales, and the production of quality hogs and lean pork, sold in both domestic and export markets.
In early 2000, a major Pork Industry decline began to impact the Maritime Provinces, a result of changes at the national level including: rising feed costs, retail sector consolidations, transportation costs, the Canadian dollar, country of origin labelling, Western hog sector expansion, aging processing facilities and the realities of production economics in smaller regions of Canada.
In Nova Scotia, provincial hog production dropped from over 200,000 annual market hogs to approximately 65,000 animals in 2016. In Prince Edward Island the drop over the same period was from 230,000 animals annually to 75,000. The prolonged industry downturn, resulted in a total abandonment of federally inspected pork slaughter facilities and the associated processing infrastructure. This lack of key industry processing and value adding resources is now limiting the opportunity to rebuild industry production levels, develop value added pork products and create export sales for producers in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. Currently, less than 3% of the total pork consumed in Nova Scotia, is produced in the province. While this situation is a provincial food supply weakness, it also is an opportunity to implement a Pork Industry renewal strategy to displace quantities of imported pork products. This will require a strategy structured around a new unique business model, that can unite regional stakeholders around a new system to produce, process and deliver pork products to a target group of customers. Most pork sold and consumed in Atlantic Canada is processed, not fresh pork. Therefore, value added pork processing needs to be a key component of any regional hog industry renewal strategy.
The successful renewal strategy must also address concerns of all stakeholders: industry, processors, wholesalers, retailers, government, investors and the pork consumer. The old pork industry business model will not take the Maritime Hog Industry successfully and profitably into the future. The market is demanding a new and forward-looking model, organizing the various stakeholders around a common vision and strategy, that is scalable, sustainable, and flexible enough to realign in response to the market changes and challenges of the future as required. This initiative has been undertaken to identify a model that can give both the Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island Pork Industries a distinct, sustainable and competitive advantage in a competitive global marketplace.