Sustainable Development, Research & Data Management
Sustainability Initiatives
Advancing the Manitoba hog sector’s sustainability efforts remained a key focus for Manitoba Pork. In 2025, Manitoba Pork’s Sustainability Framework was incorporated on Manitoba Pork’s website. The Framework is built on five key pillars essential to the long-term sustainability of the sector: (1) Economy and Innovation, (2) Environment, (3) People and Culture, (4) Animal Care and Food Safety, and (5) Sector Engagement.
Each of the five sustainability pillars is accompanied by a goal and a series of commitments that will guide Manitoba Pork on its ongoing path towards sector sustainability and communicate the organization’s sustainability efforts to producers, sector stakeholders and the public.
Manitoba Pork’s sustainability efforts also extended beyond provincial borders. This year, sustainability data collected by Manitoba Pork from over 25 Manitoba hog farms was used to provide benchmarking data in a national lifecycle analysis of Canadian hog farms.
Government Relations
Manitoba Pork recognizes the importance of maintaining strong collaborative relationships with the federal and provincial governments and frequently meets with elected officials of all parties and both senior levels of government. To assist in 2025 Government Relations efforts, Manitoba Pork developed detailed position papers and briefing notes of several issues of importance to Manitoba’s hog sector, including trade, country of origin labelling, sector expansion, and labour challenges throughout the value chain.
Municipal Outreach
In 2025, Manitoba Pork continued its municipal outreach campaign, holding face-to-face meetings with five municipal councils.
Municipal outreach allows Manitoba Pork to develop a dialogue with local governments and provides excellent opportunities to relay key facts on the hog production and processing sector in Manitoba, provide information on the economic benefits of hog barn development to the local area and to the province, as well as an overview of the comprehensive process involved in site selection and the environmental regulatory process.
To date, Manitoba Pork has met with upwards of 60 rural municipalities since municipal outreach efforts began. These discussions have resulted in Manitoba Pork starting a dialogue and building relationships with over 500 councillors and municipal officials.
Manitoba Pork’s 2025 municipal outreach efforts also involved partnering with the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) on their spring and fall conventions in Brandon and Winnipeg and the Manitoba Chambers of Commerce economic summit in Winkler.
Research Support
In 2025, Manitoba Pork continued its long-standing commitment of supporting swine research by contributing nearly $400,000 towards research and institutional funding. The goal of this research support is to help ensure the future sustainability and prosperity of the hog sector.
Since 1999, Manitoba Pork has directly contributed close to $13 million to swine production research, environmental research, and institutional development. This funding has normally been matched by 3:1 or 4:1 funding from government and from other sources. Because of this funding ratio, it can be conservatively estimated that Manitoba Pork’s funding has generated well over $40 million towards swine research over the past 25 years.
A research highlight for 2025 for Manitoba Pork and the entire Canadian swine value chain was a sector driven call for proposals coordinated by Swine Innovation Porc (SIP) on priority research topics identified in collaboration with Manitoba Pork.
Swine Cluster 4 at a Glance
$20.16
Million Program
from 2023-2028
$10.63m Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada
$9.53m Industry Partners
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50
RESEARCHERS
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13
RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS
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36
INDUSTRY PARTNERS
-
1
INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION
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15
RESEARCH PROJECTS
Cluster projects are targeting key sector priorities
In addition to research investments, the Swine Cluster enables research coordination and knowledge transfer activities
Research Collaboration and Coordination by the Numbers
Stakeholder Collaborations
This year, Manitoba Pork continued building on strong relationships with other agricultural commodity groups, environmental organizations and business partners. These partnerships provide excellent opportunity for Manitoba Pork to collaborate and dialogue with provincial leaders and other organizations and stakeholders focused on ensuring Manitoba’s long term economic and environmental prosperity.
In 2025, Manitoba Pork sponsored conferences or events hosted by the following organizations: Keystone Agricultural Producers, Manitoba Chambers of Commerce, Association of Manitoba Municipalities, University of Manitoba Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences, Assiniboine Community College, Red River Basin Commission, Economic Development Association of Manitoba, Manitoba Association of Watersheds, Manitoba Environmental Industries Association, the Manitoba Swine Seminars, the Prairie Livestock Exposition, among others.
It is estimated that Manitoba Pork sponsored stakeholder events in 2025 were attended by well over 5,000 delegates.
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15+
Events
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5K+
Attendees
Sector Expansion Initiatives
Through the Swine Infrastructure Development Corporation (SIDC), Manitoba Pork is available to assist producers in navigating the barn development and expansion process including coordinating the provincial technical review and municipal conditional use processes. SIDC offers producers interested in expanding a complementary site visit to discuss expansion plans and any potential challenges and opportunities and liaises with provincial departments as required on expansion proposals.
In 2025, SIDC provided five complementary on-farm site visits and liaised with four provincial departments on expansion-related projects.
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5
FARMS
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4
DEPARTMENTS
Indigenous-Led
Market Development
In 2025, Manitoba Pork also collaborated with the provincial government and an Indigenous-led development agency on the preparation of a feasibility study exploring the business case of marketing local Indigenous raised hogs and branded pork in southeast Asian markets. These efforts aligned with a goal identified in Manitoba Pork’s strategic plan on exploring outreach opportunities and partnerships with organizations and in individuals currently not well represented in Manitoba’s hog sector.
Industry Services Coordination
In 2025, Manitoba Pork continued to provide support to producers and partners in all segments of the hog and pork value chain. These efforts included:
| Activity 1/1/2025 - 12/4/2025 | Numbers |
|---|---|
| QA validations Processed | 520 |
| Small Scale Producers Registered | 14 |
| PigSAFE|PigCARE communications sent | 1,201 |
| Ear Tag Sales Manitoba Pork Stock | 5,545 |
| Manure Spreading Maps Posted 2024 | 107 |
| Organizational Records Updated | 448 |