Risk of Salmonella shedding in different pig production systems

Summary

The objective of this paper is to describe the Salmonella transfer risk in different conventional and organic pig production systems. Twelve organic, 12 conventional outdoor and 12 conventional indoor herds participated in the investigation. Faecal sam-ples from approximately 50 pigs per herd collected before and after transport to the abattoir were ana-lysed for density of Salmonella, and meat juice sam-ples from the pigs were analysed for antibodies against S. enterica. The results showed that 9,5 % of the organic and 8,1 % of the conventional outdoor pigs were seropositive, but they were unlikely to shed Salmonella on-farm, and less than 1,9 % of the pigs were shedding Salmonella at the abattoir. The indoor pigs had a seroprevalence of 6,8 %, and 2,6 % and 4,0 % of the pigs were shedding Salmonella on-farm and at the abattoir, respectively. This suggests that pigs from low input systems may be more resistant to the pathogen. Further analyses of the data are needed to evaluate the effect of different management strategies in the herds.