FARM VISIT ▶▶▶
Staying positive in challenging times
Battling power cuts and poor national pork consumption rates are just two of the challenges South African pig farmer CP Kriek faces each week on his farm. However, maximising efficiency by investing in new technology and modernising ageing pig housing is helping Kriek control his costs in the constant fight for profit.
BY CHRIS MCCULLOUGH, CORRESPONDENT B PROFILE
Name: CP Kriek Function: Managing director of Taaibosch Group Description: Taaibosch Piggery is located in Fochville, situated on the border of Gauteng and North West provinces, South Africa, about 100km west of Johannesburg. It has 2,200 sows for far- row-to-finish production plus a 250-sow genetic nucleus. In total, annually, the farm produces 48,000 pigs for slaughter. There is also an on-farm gene transfer centre for both the nucleus and commercial herds. The 400ha grounds include an on-site feed mill, fields for hay production and some beef cattle.
y African standards, Taaibosch Piggery, part of the Taaibosch Group, is quite a large operation. Kriek is the managing director of the group, of which he and his family – wife Gerda and children Dean, Ava
and Brendan – are shareholders.
The sprawling piggery is located in Fochville, situated on the border of Gauteng and North West provinces, about 100km west of Johannesburg. It’s a fairly standard farrow-to-finish pig unit with 2,200 breeding sows. Additionally, there is a genetic nucleus with capacity for 250 sows. There is also an on-farm gene transfer centre for both the nucleus and commercial herds.
Producing late-maturing finisher pigs Kriek’s goal is to produce a late-maturing finisher pig which is a top quality animal that attracts a decent market value. “We put a lot of focus and value on a good effective finishing pig and pride ourselves on a late-maturing finisher,” says Kriek. “Gilts are mated at about 33 weeks of age as we prefer them to be slightly more mature at the time of mating. We carry out 100% AI on all sows, except for the odd one that comes into heat at a strange time, and we have our own on-site AI station. “We start marketing from 20 weeks, after we individually weigh and record pigs at 19 weeks,” says Kriek. “We don’t cas- trate boars, and all the males are marketed before 22 weeks. The females are marketed up to 24 weeks old. Our aim is to market an 83–85kg carcass or around 110kg live weight. “All our pigs are sold to accredited processors or abattoirs in the Gauteng province. Because we weigh and market individ- ually, we direct them to the most desired market. Currently our heavies, those with a carcass over 80kg, are sold for 22.75 rand/kg (€ 1.10) and the baconers, around 70kg carcass, are sold for 24.00 rand/kg (€ 1.16),” he says.
Variety of breeds Taaibosch Piggery uses a variety of breeds in the herd to im- prove the productive traits of the offspring, including the popular names and some homemade ones. Kriek says: “We use Large White and Landrace as an F1 commercial cross as this is a good combination of maternal and terminal traits, with good reproductive performance and good terminal po- tential. We also use a combination of terminal lines, including Duroc for growth rate, marbling and quality and Pietrain for muscling and carcass yield.” He adds, “There is also the Taaibosch homebred composite to combine farm-specific traits which have proved economically valuable over the years, mixing Large White, Pietrain and Duroc.”
20 ▶PIG PROGRESS | Volume 36, No. 5, 2020
PHOTOS: CP KRIEK
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