FARM VISIT ▶▶▶


her roughly 180 finisher pigs/week at 130kg liveweight (95kg dead weight). There is slaughterline detection for boar taint. Ten Have also has a deal with retailer Plus and talks are un- derway with other retailers and meatpackers as well. The high quality pork is marketed as “Hamletz” or as “Boerd- erijvlees” (Farm Meat) at the Albert Heijn retail stores. It is characterised as healthier, lean, having less drip loss and be- ing full of intramuscular fat. Exactly which breeds are used is kept secret – as is the premium she receives for each two-star pig delivered to the slaughterhouse.


Enjoying the sunshine: Finisher pigs like to do some sunbathing.


– even during the first days of lactation. Preweaning mortali- ty is roughly 15%, Ten Have-Mellema says, adding that most victims would be the weaker animals in the litter. At four weeks’ weaning, the farm achieves 29 piglets weaned/sow/ year, although she adds that ideally she would like to move to a weaning time of five weeks. These sows have a space of 2.10m x 3m which is considerably more than is required by law. Most of the free farrowing pens are Pro Dromi design, which is marketed by Vereijken Hooijer, and they come with a large covered piglet nest. The farm also provides jute sacks for when sows want to build a nest prior to farrowing. Ten Have-Mellema says, “One of the nicest things about this, I must admit, is that the sows can actually look at their piglets. I did not realise this, but this is what sows always aim to do, so they will be always looking at the piglet nest.” Some of the lactation pens still need converting to free farrowing – and the pigs from these sows will be sold as one- star. In a few rooms, brand new farrowing pens have been equipped by other companies, as the farm would like to compare the effectiveness and working ease of other designs as well.


Feed and outdoor Ten Have farm is not a three-star facility because the feed she provides to her sows and grower pigs is not organic and be- cause lactating sows have no option to go outdoors – some- thing for which there is no space considering that her farm houses 600 sows. The farm’s journey is not finished – Ten Have-Mellema knows that. It’s an ongoing process to becoming more successful, with hiccups and challenges to overcome. At the moment, she has a contract with the Netherlands’ largest retailer Albert Heijn, which sells the pork in roughly 185 stores throughout the country. That contract automatically also led to good con- tacts with meatpacker Vion in Groenlo, which has a special slaughterline for high welfare animals and where she sends


Proud and outgoing Ten Have is undoubtedly one of the country’s most well- known swine producers and she is proud and happy to talk about her business to media. Her farm has a nice reception area overlooking part of the finisher houses – and she re- ceives many visitors annually. Understandably, other pig pro- ducers in the country follow her steps with a mixture of inter- est and amazement but also hesitancy. Ten Have-Mellema understands that and admits that it has been, for instance, difficult to sell every body part under the two-star scheme. She is, nevertheless, convinced that the road she has taken has been the right one for her. She says, “If you don’t try, you will never learn how to get there.”


Animal welfare labels


For more than a decade, Dutch meat, eggs and dairy products can be marketed with a label called “Beter Lev- en” (Better Life). This animal welfare label indicates the level of welfare the animals received during their lives. Products can be awarded with one, two or three stars de- pending on the amount of extras farms offered during the life of the animals – with three stars normally being awarded to organic production. The scheme was in 2007 initiated by the Dierenbescherming, an animal welfare or- ganisation of the Netherlands, and has ever since been widely adopted. Under pressure from animal welfare or- ganisations, the vast majority of retailers moved to only selling fresh pork with at least one star.


Meat from Ten Have’s farm sold at a local retailer; note the two-star label.


▶PIG PROGRESS | Volume 36, No. 6, 2020


www.pigprogress.net/ worldofpigs


21


PHOTO: VINCENT TER BEEK


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