This morning we headed to Cristines piggery. Although pork prices have been
low for more than the last 10 years, and grain prices relatively costly for
their business, Cristine and her husband have been able to set up a very
efficient piggery operation.
They used to buy their piglets in and fatten them up, but it was bringing in
many diseases and leading to a lot of medical costs and mortality. Now that
they are breeding their own piglets, the system is working much better. They
have already set up for the EU rule change next year, of all sows being run in
a free range operation, rather than stalls. This has been a good thing for
their business, and has allowed them to run more pigs. They have an automatic
feeder, which involves each pig having an electronic ear tag, so when they
enter the feeding stall, they are fed exactly the right amount of food, for their
current situation. Eg if a sow is very pregnant, the tag will tell that to the
feeder and give it more food.
They grow all their own maize and wheat, and only have to import canola and
barley. They have a very good silo setup, but get a contractor in to mix the
pig food. They have also been able to use the manure waste from the piggery, to
generate electricity from the methane gas, in a huge tank. They are paid
18cents per unit, then they buy their own electricity in at 7 cents per unit.
Got to love EU subsidies!!!!
For lunch we visited a restaurant that served Briesse chicken. A special
chicken that is produced in the Briesse area, and protected by a geographical
indication site (GIC). Which is like the ‘champagne’ thing. You can not produce
champagne any where else in the world, and call it champagne unless it is
produced in the Champagne area in France. So this chicken can only produced in
Briesse. It was .....ok, but not fantastic!
So after lunch we got to visit a farm that is producing Briesse chooks. They
are all free range and actually do have large paddocks that they all wander
around all day in the grass. Then every night they are locked in the sheds for
protection, and let out the next morning. The young couple running the chicken
business said it was profitable but a lot of hard work to keep up with all the regulations
and paperwork that goes with it.
We also visited a shop, where the chicken was being sold. This was a sort of
farmer market shop, that had been set up by the town council. 25 farmers had
joined the shop, and each sold their own produce in the store. It was run like
a co-op, but each farmer also had to work at the store for a day or so a week.
The aim is to get the grower talking to the customer, which is a really great
idea! Depending on how much they sold, they had to work a certain amount of
days in the store.
We have had a fantastic trip in France, and I have really, really enjoyed!
Off to Washington tomorrow.
Antony, and his Briesse chook.
A giant chook where we had lunch and me being a chook underneat.
Header front that folds in half for roads and gates
No comments:
Post a Comment