MANAGEMENT ▶▶▶
Lean solution to fatten profits on pig farms
The EU PiG Innovation Group aims to discover and share best practices and innovations in swine production. In this episode: the 5S Lean Programme.
BY NATALIE BERKHOUT, CORRESPONDENT
The Ambassador Pig farmer Pat O’Keeffe from Cork, Ireland. He operates a 2,000 sow integrated pig farm, O’Keeffe Piggeries, breeding and finishing the pigs to slaughter weight.
The innovation Some of the best innovations are the simplest, and this is one of them. The 5S Lean Programme, pioneered by Toyota Motor Company, applies standard housekeeping practices in the workplace through the 5 principles of Sort, Set in order, Shine, Standardise, and Sustain. The team looks at the overall farm and instead of trying to im- prove everything, they select areas which had the highest us- age and the most issues. For O’Keeffe Piggeries, a 5S lean pro- gramme was developed for the maintenance, mineral storage, medicine storage and mixing rooms. Areas were mapped out, staff were trained and the programme was implemented and closely monitored through checklists and audits. A Kanban sys- tem was put in place to organise and store mineral samples by month of use, and a number- and colour-coded chart was used with scores – a score of 6 signifies substantial action is needed, a score of 7 or 8 being means minor corrections are needed, and 9 and 10 mean ‘acceptable’.
The idea Lean principles are widely used and have proven themselves as cost savings in many industries. Commercial pig farms run as a business and so the application of Lean Manufacturing was investigated.
The collaboration The project is a collaboration between the Agriculture and Food Development Authority in Ireland (Teagasc), the Irish Food Marketing Board (Bord Bia) and the Department of Agri- culture, Food and the Marine. This 5S project that was carried
out on O’Keeffe Piggeries was in collaboration with lean con- sultant Barry O’Brien from the Leading Edge Group consul- tancy firm, and Ciarán Carroll, a pig advisor with Teagasc.
Advantages • The programme is simple. • A more organised workplace. • Equipment and tools are easier to find. • The storage of samples and medicines is streamlined. • Less wasted product. • Checklists and audits ensure that there is always enough medicine on site, while avoiding having too much on site.
• Overall, there are time savings of 30 minutes per staff member per day. This adds up to a lot of time and money.
• The financial savings will be in the region of € 10,000 to € 20,000 per year.
The costs Initial one-off costs associated with the consultant who pro- vides the Lean 5S training and developed and monitored the plan come to approximately € 3,000 (€ 1.50 per sow or € 0.05 per pig). Other minor costs include paper for the checklists and audits and containers for the mineral samples.
Can other pig farms benefit? This is a simple innovation that can have a significant impact on a pig farm. It is easy to implement and has international application across any farm business. It shows the broader pig sector what can be done by implementing simple manage- ment strategies on the farm that don’t cost a lot of money.
▶PIG PROGRESS | Volume 36, No. 6, 2020 15
The 5S Lean Pro- gramme is a sim- ple innovation that can have a significant im- pact.
PHOTO: O’KEEFFE PIGGERIES
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