Swine audits provide animal care scorecard

By Dyneah Classen, DVM, Carthage Veterinary Service Ltd. Harvest facilities (packers) have started third-party auditing requirements for hog farms supplying or marketing hogs to them. The audit programs initially varied by packer and were intended to assure consumers that the animals that produce their pork are well cared for throughout all stages of production. In 2013, the National Pork Board identified a need to streamline the process and began a task force to develop a Common Swine Industry Audit. In October 2014, the NPB officially announced that a new common swine industry audit platform for pork producers, packers and processors was certified by the Professional Animal Auditor Certification Organization. The latest versions of the Pork Quality Assurance Plus and PQA Site Assessment have been updated to include information and help farms prepare for the CSIA. The purpose of the CSIA is the same as the individual packer audits to verify that the pork industry's approved animal well-being standards are followed. The administrative assistant from the third-party auditing service will take down some initial information like farm location, size of the farm, biosecurity downtime and protocols to enter the farm(s). Goal of audit tool The overarching goal of the common audit process is to provide consumers greater assurance of the care taken by farmers and pork processors to improve animal well-being and food safety. The audit tool builds on the existing PQA Plus program and expands it to serve as a single, common audit platform for the pork industry.