Industry Survey Results

2019/20 snapshot of results

Membership

75% of respondents were members of APL. 72% of total respondents were satisfied with the membership services APL provided. The reasons that producers do not become members remain unclear from the data but could include that the producers are unaware of or uninterested in the benefit of membership.

Communications

83% of respondents were satisfied with the frequency of APL communications. 10% preferred more and 4% wanted less. 3% did not receive any communications from APL.

Effectiveness of Levy Use

64% of respondents reported that they thought APL was using producer levies effectively and 77% reported they thought APL was doing a good job overall. 57% of respondents thought APL provided a direct or indirect benefit to their business. This represented 85% of industry when weighted against sow numbers.

Most respondents stated that marketing was the most crucial area that they thought levies should be focussed on.

Housing and Husbandry

91% of production had completely gestation stall free (GSF) systems. 34% of respondents representing 84% of production had phased out the use of gestation stalls in their systems at the time of the survey.

97% of production was using conventional farrowing crates and 85% of respondents were not planning on changing the way their farrowing system was run.

Antimicrobial Stewardship (AMS) plans were adopted by 21% of respondents (65% of production), and 9% of respondents were not aware of what an AMS plan was.

Labour

58% of organisations employed staff, representing 97% of production. 27% of organisations reported having a staffing shortage.

62% of organisations believe that there are not enough staff training opportunities in the industry.

Environment

An environmental management plan had been adopted by 77% of respondents (98% of production). Respondents accounting for 81% of production considered themselves to be very water secure.

Waste Bedding Materials

74% of respondents (55% of production) used waste bedding and manure for on-farm fertiliser. 29% of respondents stored and composted it on-farm and 10% sold it to other farms.

Soil Testing

57% of respondents (83% of production) said that they tested their soil, 67% of which tested their soil once per year.

Effluent and Energy

The data on effluent collection showed producers mainly used an underfloor collection system. However, when weighed against the production, the most common effluent collection method was a combination of deep litter and under floor collection systems (57% of production).

6% of respondents (6 organisations) used biogas to produce energy (39% of production).

Capacity and Infrastructure Planning

32% of respondents planned to build new infrastructure in 2020.

2019 Industry Survey: Full results

2018/19 Snapshot of results

Click on the link below to access a snapshot of the 2018-19 Industry Survey. The full report is available to producers who responded to the survey.

2018 Industry Survey: Snapshot of results