Pig Production Guide

• Overview
• Pig Production
• Environment
• Assurance Scheme
• Legislation
• Breeding Indoors
• Breeding Outdoors
• Finishing Indoors - Straw
• Finishing Indoors - Slats
• Finishing Outdoors

Environment

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The UK pig industry is a very environmentally aware sector of UK agriculture and is actively involved both this and the climate change debate, working closely with government and regulators. 

This approach is being formalised through the Pig Industry Environmental Strategy (P.I.E.S) being developed by BPEX and a number of stakeholders including producers, Defra, EA, researchers and allied industries.

Efficient production is directly compatible with environmental sustainability, for example, the more efficient a system is in utilising resources, the lower the waste and emissions per unit of output.

With a growing environmental awareness there comes increasing amounts of environmental legislation for the industry to work within.  The EU will issue a directive which is then put into force by the governments of the member states.  The diagram below shows some of the more important of these applying to pig production within the UK.

Besides the regulations there are a number of authorities and regulatory bodies including Defra, the State Veterinary Service (SVS) and the Environment Agency (EA).