Associations between pig leg health and lean meat growth in commercial organic herds

Summary

Sustainable development of organic pig production needs to include both animal welfare and productivity aspects. Knowledge about associations between animal welfare and productivity could be a key for constructive, long-term development of organic as well as conventional pig production systems. Poor leg health is considered a central animal welfare issue in organic pig production in Sweden. The preliminary results presented in this paper indicate that pigs in organic herds with more severe leg problems have poorer lean meat growth. However, the majority of the lame pigs had milder forms of leg problems, which were not found to be associated with lean meat growth.