PIGGERY

A pig farmer who start farming business with 22 adult pigs which comprise of 20 females and 2 males. If in a year each of the 20 female pigs delivers 20 more pigs ( at 10 pigs/delivery). At the end of the calendar year, that farmers would be having 400 pigs. Let’s assume at the end of the year the farmer were only able to manage 80 matured pigs. Which the farmer sold at 40k each (depending of course on their weight).

I’ll leave you to do the mathematics, but don’t let the huge figures fool you. You have got a lot of work to do and to achieve the above senerio which by the way is 100% achievable.

In addition, let’s also assume the farmer have his own vegetable farm, or plants potato, maize, cassava etc. Hence saves a lot of money and doesn't have to spend a fortune to feed his pigs.

Let me say upfront that your business profitability would largely depend on how much knowledge you have about such business. Truth is most people who intend to start a business, would never think of getting any entrepreneurship training. Neither do they have any experienced pig farmer as mentor or spend time to visit and study a nearby pig farm.  Nor undergo a practical pig farming training and they’d just think the above senerio would work for them no matter what.

Let us be of service to you. Better still allow us to lead you on the path to becoming a successful pig farmer.

Now let’s get down, get our hands dirty and get into the nitty gritty of setting up your own pig farming business.

Before you would ever think of going to purchasing your little piglets for stocking. You should give the first priority to a secured farming premises and some of these outlined activities below.

CONSTRUCT A SECURED BREEDING GROUND.

Its no news that pigs are fatty animals. Hence they have need for a lot of space area for their activities. You need to consider your feeding plan. Whether you intend to go the methods of complete intensive, semi intensive or open grazing system.

Most pig farmers would prefer the semi intensive method of pig farming. Furthermore, they would usually start their business with between 50 to 150 piglets (although you can begin with even lesser number of pigs in your backyard). Then gradually increase the number of their fold. Should in case you fall into this category, then you will need between 2-5 acres of land. This will enable the pigs to graze in the open and retire to the pen where they are tired. They can continue feeding and playing while in the pen.

Choosing a Rural Area

If you choose to set up your pig farm in a rural area, ensure there are motor-able route to your farm. Furthermore, You can lease a land from a period of 3 years up. (nothing less than 3 years) before you will be able to buy a land of your own.

If you can device a great marketing strategy (which I will discuss later on this article), butchers will even fight over themselves to come to your farm to buy your pigs. This would reduce your budgeted cost of transportation to sell off your pork in city markets.

While you are giving consideration to construction of a breeding ground for your pig farming business, the following should be your top priority:

• ACCESS TO CLEAN WATER 

Pigs don't have sweat pores to control their temperature. This is the main reason why you often see them wallowing in water either clean or dirty water. Especially when they are hot. Pigs are not dirty as you presume. Get them clean water always, you will see how clean they are. As a matter of facts, they need a bath to cool off. Pigs also drink lots of water, so think about a ready source of clean water supply when choosing a pig farming location.

• ACCESS TO TRANSPORT FACILITIES

Accessibility to your farm is a necessity for buying and selling of your pigs. If your farm is not easily accessible, no butchers would fight over themselves to buy from you. Even getting your goods and feeds to the farm or to the market, could be hell experience. Considers these factor before  setting up your farm.

• ENVISAGE THE FUTURE OF THE BUSINESS

when you begin your farming business, days can quickly turn into months and months into years. Whatever would inconvenience you now might be more inconveniencing in two years. Whatever looks fairly OK for you now, would be too small in two years. For instance; When you buy your little piglets for stocking. Look at the space you have provided for them, try to see them as full grown pigs. Then imagine if the space is OK or too small for them. If it’ll be too small, then make amends “while the sun shines”. Most pig farmers usually adopt the semi intensive system of rearing pigs. This method comprises of having a pig pen on one end of the farm. Having an open grazing land area where the animals can do their open grazing.

It’s always a good practice to raise pigs in pasture by leaving them occasionally to root around in the fields where they can find plants to eat, and that can only be achieved when you have large enough land space to cater for their amusement. You would need to secure your farm land if you want to adopt this approach, pigs often wander away if adequate security measures are not taken.

• BUILD STANDARD PENS

Big spacious pen is important if you don’t want your pigs to injure themselves. A good and specious pen is also important to keep the pigs healthy and free from diseases and contamination. Proper drainage is needed too to avoid water becoming stagnant in your pen which could attract insects and other harmful pests to harm your pigs.

To avoid your pigs getting overly dirty, you need to build a water pool where they can play and swim ( pigs likes swimming) and cool themselves which is important to their well being. Changing the water and refilling the pool as frequently as possible will ensure that they are clean all the time. If you are keeping them outdoor, shelter should be build for them.

Important Points to Note for Pig Housing

• Construct shed on dry and properly raised ground.
• Avoid water – logging, marshy and heavy rainfall areas.
• The side walls of the sheds should be 4 – 5 ft. high and remaining height should be fitted with pipes or wooden poles.
• The walls should be plastered to make them damp proof.
• The roof should be at least 8 – 10 ft. high.
• The pig sty should be well ventilated.
• The floor should be concrete/hard , even, non – slippery, impervious, well sloped (3 cm per metre) and properly drained to remain dry and clean.
• A feed trough space of 6 – 12 inches per pig should be provided. The corners of feed troughs, drains and walls should be rounded for easy cleaning.
• Provide adequate open space for each animal which should be double of covered area
• Provide proper shade and cool drinking water during hot seasons.

Deep litter pig housing

Deep litter housing is a type of pig housing where the floor is filled with sawdust 2 – 3 feet in the both open and covered area. This method of pig farming is well suited for high rainfall and high altitude area. The floor of the pen remains clean and dry due to the sawdust. The pig house also provides better micro – environment in summer and winter as well as better physiological adaptation. This model provide 2 – 3 times higher manure than that conventional concrete floor pigpen.

Advantages of deep litter housing

• Deep litter housing is well suited for high rainfall and high altitude area.
• The floor of the pen remains clean and dry due to the sawdust.
• The pig house also provides better micro – environment both summer and winter, better physiological adaptation.
• This model provide 2 – 3 times higher manure than that conventional concrete floor pigpen

BUY HEALTHY PIGLETS

A Healthy piglet

To ensure a healthy farm, you need to make sure the piglets you are about to start your farm with are purchased from a healthy source. Buy from trusted pig dealers and make sure the ones you are buying has a history of proper vaccination. You might want to look out for the signs of a healthy pigs, some of which I have listed below;

• Glossy coat
• Good temperament ( watch out for aggressive piglets and be avoid them like a plague )
• Having good appetite
• Clear bright eyes
• Check for any sign of muscular cramps or pains and avoid such piglets.

Some popular breeds in Nigeria to choose from are; 

• local breeds of white, brown, and black colored pigs.
• Common foreign breeds are: Hampshire, Hereford pig, American Yorkshire, Berkshire pig, Landrace, Tamworth pig, Duroc, Mulefoot pig, and a few others.

You can also get various hybrid piglets in your Country. These hybrid grow quicker with high resistance to diseases.

Important Tip 

1. Every farming business is a learning curve. So I usually advice young entrepreneurs who want to go into piggery business to start small. Then, grow along the learning curve. This way, you will be able to learn the highs and lows of the business and should anything go wrong at this stage, your risk will be very minimal.
2. This is one of the reason am giving you an editable free pig farming business plan to adequately plan your farm and forecast its yearly growth.
3. Talk To Veterinary Doctor – You need the services of vet doctors especially as a young pig farmer, as you gain more experience in the business, you would not be needing them as much.
4. Vet doctors are would help you to perform regular check up and vaccination as well as feeding and nutrition advice. Pigs generally eats what human being eat and doe not present much worries when it comes to feed.

• EMPLOY WORKERS

Employ 4 – 5 persons if your pigs are up to 100. If you are starting on a smaller scale, you may need lesser number of worker 1 – 2 workers who will be assisting in the cleaning of the pigs and the pens, feeding the pigs and making sure they are well behaved and other things necessary.

• FEEDING

Just like humans, Pigs eat a wide variety of foods, anything humans can eat, they can eat. Like humans as well, they need a balanced diet such as fibre, energy, protein, carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals to thrive. Feeding will take the major chunk of your spending in the farm.

Pigs, like all animals, must have constant access to clean fresh drinking water. They’d also love tipping the trough to make a wallow, pigs will also stand in the water trough and wash their dirty faces in it, so it needs to be checked regularly, cleaned out and refilled. Galvanised troughs are robust and easy to clean, and are usually not too easy for the pigs to tip over. Automatic drinkers are available but aren’t half as much fun for the pigs

HOW TO TAKE CARE OF FARM PIGS

Generally raising newborn piglets need a pen house temperature of around 95 degrees Fahrenheit for the first week. Then the temperature should be dropped by 5 degrees each week until it is time for weaning. Young piglets must also be allowed to either root in the soil, on the other hand you can buy iron supplement from pet stores.

Young growing piglets should be offered creep feed until they are fully weaned. you should also offer them pasture but ensure you provide only the most nutritious available pasture to encourage growth, since their stomachs are not yet developed enough for rougher or less nutritious fare.

Pumpkin ( popularly known as ugwu) stems (which the vegetable sellers would gladly give for free after they have removed the leaves) do serve as an excellent nutritional pasture for both young and matured pigs.

To properly care for pigs, you need to pay wrapped attention to three key aspects;

• Good health care.
• Good/ Proper housing and
• Good diet.

We shall now talk about these three vital aspects of caring for farm pigs.

Good Health Care

Providing your pigs the vaccines recommended for your local area by a veterinarian, and limiting the pigs’ contact with other animals, will go a long way toward preventing disease. It is also crucial to keep their housing area clean and free of manure.

Pigs are often prone to worm infections, especially if they are not rotated through different pastures. Many worm species leave eggs or larvae in the host animals’ feces, and rotating to a new pasture helps to disrupt ,the worms’ life cycles. If your pigs do get worms, use a commercial dewormer and feed your pigs fresh garlic to help eliminate the infection. More on this when i shall be discussing common pig sicknesses and treatments.

Your veterinarian also may administer a tablespoon of wormwood powder per 25 pounds of pig.

Good/ Proper Housing

If you’re raising pigs on a pasture, they will need only a covered three-sided shelter large enough for them all to lie down beside each other inside. A board fence around the pasture with a single strand of electrified perimeter wire will be enough to keep pigs contained.

You can raise pigs in a pen exclusively inside a barn, but the enclosure will need deep bedding to allow for rooting, and it will need frequent cleaning to help prevent disease. Whether indoors or outdoors, piglets will need 16 square feet of space each, while weaners and older pigs require closer to 40 square feet.

If the winter temperatures in your area drop much below 60 degrees Fahrenheit, you will need to offer supplemental heating, such as a heat lamp or heated floor mat.

In the summer your pigs will need a wallow, an area with mud and water, in order to keep cool. If you don’t provide one yourself, your pigs may dig their own.

• Good Diet

Good food and water is needed for optimal pig growth, when you offer pigs a high-quality pig feed preferably commercial hog feed that will allow them to gain weight rapidly and stay consistently healthy.

If you want to reduce considerably, the number of times a vet doctor visit your pig farm then you have to pay attention to the quality of food you are feeding your swine. A little while we shall discuss how to formulate your own pig feeds, pigs can however, benefit from a wide variety of diet types including pasture, wooded lots, scrap vegetables, whey, other dairy and day old bread, remnants from restaurants all of which can reduce their need for grain. The food you offer your pigs can affect how its meat taste.

A very important aspect of pig diets is water. Clean water should be available in the farm at all times. Automatic waterers, serviced by a hose is more preferable, you can also provide large drums of water, its usualy difficult for the pigs to overturn the drums or soil the water inside them.

OTHER PIG MANAGEMENT PRACTICE

Culling of animals: Unproductive pigs with diminished size or with very high inter-farrowing period, repeat breeders, aged animals, unproductive boars etc. are to be culled and sold out for meat purpose.

Castration of piglets: Male piglets which are unwanted and not fit for breeding purpose are to be castrated just after weaning and may be kept in the farm as fattener animal which later on may be sold for meat purpose.

Segregation of diseased animal: A separate house should be there to keep the animals suffering from contagious diseases.

• Record Keeping

The ultimate profit or loss in a farm can only be found out by keeping proper records in the farm which includes data sheet of individual animal, total stock of animals, feed register, expenditure statement etc.

COMMON PIG DISEASE AND TREATMENTS

Health care measure to be followed in a pig farm is one of the most important factors and if not followed properly, farmer may incur a heavy loss. The pigs can be infected with a number of internal parasites, skin infections and other bacterial and viral diseases, which in turn will result in poor growth and even death of pig.

Generally, symptoms of illness in pig is characterized by the following

• Dullness, 
• Loss of appetite, 
• Refusal to move or sluggish movement, Rough body coat, 
• Constipation or diarrhea, 
• Dull eyes, 
• Dull skin and hair, 
• Separates itself from the rest etc.

Piglets should be dewormed once in three months. Worms from pigs may infect human being also. Most commonly found parasitic Pig disease are Ascaries, Strong infection, Coccidiosis and mange mite infection. Drugs like Piperzine in feed and water, Fenbendazole in feed (Single dose) or Ivermectin are useful against parasitic infection in pig. The pregnant sow should be treated before farrowing. kindly contact your local veterinary on how to use these drugs, he may prescribe other drugs according to your region.

Another commonly occurring ailment in pig is the skin infection which may be caused by ticks , mites and lice. Mange caused by mites may occur around the head, ears, legs and tails which subsequently spread all over the body.

Tick and lice

Tick and lice feed on the skin and irritate the pigs which will scratch its body. The skin infection caused by the external parasites can be treated by spraying. Dipping or painting with Butox – 1% solution spray or dipping or Tickting or Deltamethrin (two application at 1 0 days interval or Ivermectin should be done regularly. Other diseases like piglet diarrhoea, salmonellosis, mastitis etc can be treated when it occurs in consultation with your local veterinarian.

Notable infectious diseases of pigs

Classical swine fever or Hog cholera is one of the most important and devastating viral diseases of pigs. The disease affects both domesticated and wild pigs under natural conditions. It is characterized by fever, multiple generalized petechial and ecchymotic hemorrhages giving rise to visceral and skin lesion. Symptoms of tremor, in coordination and paralysis and occasionally peracute death without any signs may also be observed.

Pig farmers are advised to vaccinate the animals against swine fever about 20 – 30 days before breeding.

Respiratory disorder/ Pneumonia

This is frequently caused by Pasteurella, it is considered to be an important disease of pigs. Symptoms in affected pigs are apathetic, anorexia, high fever, coughing and sneezing, difficulty in breathing, red eyes with discharge. The treatment is more effective if appropriate antibiotic is used based on the drug sensitivity of the isolated bacteria.

Colibacillosis (piglet diarrhoea)

It is caused by pathogenic strains of Escherichia coli and its a disease primarily of the newborn or young pigs. The disease may be manifested by diarrhea,respiratory distress and arthritis. Thorough sanitation, adequate feeding of colostrums and milk during the first few hours after birth is important to reduce the problem. Oral rehydration therapy along with specific antibiotics is useful for the treatment of the affected piglets. Occurrence of most of the diseases can be prevented by following strict hygienic measure and by timely vaccination of pigs.

A separate house should be provided to keep the animals suffering from contagious diseases in isolation or quarantine.

HOW TO FORMULATE YOUR OWN PIG FEED

While you can buy bags of premixed pig food at most farm supply stores, you might want to make your own pig food mix. Many people believe that you can feed pigs anything, such as your table scraps and whatever else you can get your hands on. While it’s true that pigs will eat just about anything, they should be fed a balanced diet just like any other animal. This is especially true if you are raising your pigs commercially, as you want them to be as healthy as possible.

Feed your weaners, or pigs that are being weaned off of their mother’s milk, a special mix of food until they are about 10 to 12 weeks old. Create a feed mix that is comprised of about 76 percent corn or wheat, 12 percent skim milk powder, 6 percent soybean meal, 6 percent calcium and protein supplement, and 0.2 percent salt.

Begin feeding your pigs a grower diet when they are about 12 weeks old. Create a feed mix that is 79 percent sorghum, 10 percent soybean meal, 7 percent calcium and protein supplement, 4 percent sunflower or peanut meal, and 0.25 percent salt.

Feed your breeder pigs a different mix than the rest of your pigs. Make a feed mix that is 80 percent sorghum, 10 percent sunflower meal, 10 percent calcium and protein supplement, and 0.25 percent salt.

HOW TO MARKET MATURED PIGS

This is the main point of starting this business in the first place. It is only proper to have a marketing plan in place even before the commencement of your enterprise. While you should have a detailed marketing plan in your pig business plan, I will give you a quick heads up on how to market your pigs to customers.

Before your pigs grow to maturity, do a feasibility study in your area, try to know those who buys, those who sells, where their main market is at, do they have a pig buyers/sellers union? and the likes.

The answers to some of these questions would tell you who to make friends with. Now make friends with your would be buyers even before your pigs is matured, asked them vital questions, buy poke meat from them and start introducing your more unique pig breeds to them ( even if your pigs is same with the ones they sell in such market).

If you do this job very well, when your pigs are ready to be shipped into the market, buyers won’t be in short supplies.

HOW TO DETERMINE PIG PRICE PRICE IN NIGERIA

We all agree that the financial return is one of the biggest motivation that entices many entrepreneurs into pig farming.

Now!

How much do pigs sell for? The answer is quite simple. Pigs are weighed and sold in amount that’s corresponding to their weight in kilograms (KG).

Let’s say you have a grown up, castrated or ready-to-be-sold pig in your pig farm. The pig buyer will know how much such pig is worth by weighing it on the scale. Let’s say your pig weighs 65KG, the price for it is 65 x the market price of a KG as at the moment.

As at the time of writing this post, the price pig in Nigeria per kilogram is about N550-N700 ( $2 – $2.5)

That may not be the price in your region. and that may not be the price as at the time you’re reading this post (so you need to find out)

Well !!!

Glad you stick around till the end of this article

Piggery as you can see from this article is not a very difficult business to run, if you put everything I’ve discussed in this article, you just need to have:

• A business plan,
• Money and the passion to succeed in this business.
• You should also learn a thing or two from other more experienced farmers in your area.
• Having a concrete plan is very invaluable if you really want to have a successful pig farm.

Do you know you can actually save yourself off this stress? 

Engage CHRIS FARM NIGERIA to give you a professional business plans and a feasibility that will suit you demand today.

Chris Farm Nigeria develops well self-explanatory, irresistible feasibility studies or business plan for your Business start ups, Business Growth or Expansions through either personal funds, Grants, or loans, which could be new or existing ones. We delight in writing for people under Academic sectors, production sectors, manufacturing sectors, processing or packing sectors, advertising sectors, marketing sectors and other related sectors on mini, middle and large scale businesses.

For your Agribusiness, either production, processing, marketing of any Agro-industry, our feasibility studies or business plan are explicit.

More on Pig, Read; 

Smart Ways On Pig Farming Business - Simple Guide

Cost & Returns In Pig Production (Get A Business  Plan & A Feasibility Study) 

Knowledge on Pig Production Get Feasibility Study 

Easy Steps In Pig Production (feasibility study & Business Plans) 

Pig-raising systems, breeds, and feasibility