Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium 2024

The 47th annual Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium will take place in Saskatoon on November 5-6, 2024 for two days of inspiring speakers from countries around the world.

Saskatchewan Pork Symposium is recognized as one of Canada’s leading pork industry conferences attracting approximately 300 producers, industry stakeholders and government representatives.

Celebrating its 47th year, expert local, national and international speakers impart the latest information on hog production, animal health & welfare, new technology and the global outlook for the North American hog industry. It's an event not to be missed!

Please visit our archive page to view some of the speakers from the event.

Practical take-home advice. Live sessions. Best practices. The latest industry trends. New research and innovation.

Host Hotel

As the host hotel for Symposium 2024, a block of rooms will be reserved at the Saskatoon Inn & Conference Centre at 2002 Airport Drive. Call 1-800-667-8789 or book directly with the hotel at 306-242-1440. Reservations can be made online, in order to get one of the reserved rooms let them know you are part of Sask Pork Symposium.

Deadline for group block reservations is October 11, 2024.

Additional Banquet Tickets - CA$75.00

Awards of Distinction

Awards are presented annually to recognize and honour individuals and organizations who contribute to the sustainability of the Saskatchewan pork industry through leadership, commitment and innovation.

We acknowledge the achievements of those who operate well above established industry regulations and standards to ensure continued growth and advancement of the hog sector.

If there is someone you know who you would like recognized, please fill out the nomination form.

2024 Symposium Sponsors

Interested in sponsorship opportunities or an exhibitor booth at Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium? Contact priley@saskpork.com for the Sponsorship Package.

Premium Sponsors

Event Sponsors

Universal Sponsors

Media Sponsors

Better Pork

Prairie Hog Country

Farmscape

Conference Agenda

November 5 & 6, 2024

DAY 1

November 5, 2024

7:15am – Registration & Breakfast

8:25am – Welcome to Symposium

8:30am – Taking Care of Basics — Measuring On-Farm Best Management Practices

                     Ken Engele, PSCI

9:15am – KEYNOTE: A Discussion on Pig Handling and Welfare

Dr. Temple Grandin

10:15am – Networking & Refreshment Break

10:45am – Promote Animal Health with a Good Water Program

                       Susan Watkins

11:30am – Advancing swine welfare practices to empower your industry: Outcomes and future directions from the
NSERC Chair in Swine Welfare

                     Martyna Lagoda, PostDoc

12:15pm – Lunch

1:15pm – Enhancing the future of pork production with new technology

                   Dr. Raj Sharma, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

2:15pm – Biosecurity – Back to Basics

                    Dr. Brad Chappell, Topigs Norsvin

3:00pm – Networking & Refreshment Break

3:30pm – CONCURRENT SESSIONS

1.      Graduate Student Oral Presentations

2.     Overview of ASF Preparedness, Zoning and Zoning Arrangements

Dr. Bobbie Lundquist, CFIA

Banquet & Awards

5:00pm – Reception

6:30pm – Evening Program

7:45pm – Awards of Distinction

8:15pm – Live Entertainment

DAY 2

November 6, 2024

7:15am – Registration & Breakfast

8:15am – Changes to Code of Practice

Stephen Heckbert,  Canadian Pork Council

9:00am – KEYNOTE: Competitive Status of the Industry

Kevin Grier

10:00am – Networking & Refreshment Break

10:30am – KEYNOTE: Navigating the Maze: Agri-Food Trends and their Impact on the Pork Industry

                       Dr. Sylvain Charlebois

11:30am – Improvest & Independent Farms - Can This Work?

                      Dr. Leanne Van De Weyer, Zoetis

12:15pm – Canada Pork Meat Cutting Demonstration

Jeremy Yim, Canada Pork

Peter Baarda, J & G Quality Meats

1:00pm – Express Lunch

Dr. Grandin is a designer of livestock handling facilities and a Professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University. Facilities she has designed are located in the United States, Canada, Europe, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, and other countries.

In North America, almost half of the cattle are handled in a center track restrainer system that she designed for meat plants.

Curved chute and race systems she has designed for cattle are used worldwide and her writings on the flight zone and other principles of grazing animal behavior have helped many people to reduce stress on their animals during handling.

She has also developed an objective scoring system for assessing handling of cattle and pigs at meat plants. This scoring system is being used by many large corporations to improve animal welfare.

She obtained her B.A. at Franklin Pierce College and her M.S. in Animal Science at Arizona State University. Dr. Grandin received her Ph.D in Animal Science from the University of Illinois in 1989.

Today she teaches courses on livestock behavior and facility design at Colorado State University and consults with the livestock industry on facility design, livestock handling, and animal welfare.

She has appeared on television shows such as 20/20, 48 Hours, CNN Larry King Live, PrimeTime Live, 60 Minutes and the Today Show. She has been featured in People Magazine, the New York Times, Forbes, U.S. News and World Report, Time Magazine, the New York Times book review, and Discover magazine. In 2010, Time Magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people. She is a Canadian and New York Times best-selling author.

Her life story has also been made into an HBO movie titled "Temple Grandin, staring Claire Danes," which won seven Emmy awards and a Golden Globe.

In 2017, she was inducted into The Women's Hall of Fame and in 2018 made a fellow by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She was named as one of the top 10 Best College Professors in 2020 by CEO Magazine.

Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety.

He is one of the world's most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the Trends in Food Science Technology journal.

He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.

Since 2012, he publishes the highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends.

He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.

Kevin Grier is a respected and connected market analyst and economic researcher.

Particular focus is on the meat, poultry, livestock and grocery product sectors.

With over 25 years of experience he has a solid understanding of Canadian and U.S. agriculture and food industry issues from farm to retail.

Kevin Grier Market Analysis and Consulting was founded in 2014 following Kevin’s 18 years with the George Morris Centre, a leader in economic research in the agriculture and food industry.

Prior to that Kevin was a manager with the Ontario Farm Products Marketing Commission, the supervisory body of the provincial regulated marketing boards.

Dr. Brad Chappell grew up in western Manitoba just north of Hamiota on a farm that raised hogs, cattle, grain and a few chickens and turkeys crossed their paths.

He completed his Agriculture Degree at the University of Manitoba and Doctor of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Saskatchewan.

Dr. Chappell has been working in animal clinics for the past two decades mainly focusing on hogs with Swine Health Professionals and now Topigs Norsvin Canada.

His work focuses on the health and biosecurity of hogs and relating health to production parameters -- and if it works.

Dr. Chappell resides on an acreage just east of Winnipeg with his wife Monica and two dogs Mia and Maggie. Aside from working in the swine industry he enjoys keeping active by kayaking, cross-country skiing or spending time in his garden or wood shop.

Ken is the Manager of Knowledge Transfer at the Prairie Swine Centre.

His position focuses on extension, specifically focusing on bringing research results to the Canadian pork industry.

His responsibilities include the development of communication strategies, best-management practices, on-farm demonstrations, and modeling the economic impact of research.

Overall, Ken has spent 20 years in the Canadian pork industry in the areas of research and commercial production, he is a graduate of the University of Saskatchewan and continues to be actively involved in the agriculture industry in Saskatchewan.

Stephen Heckbert is the Executive Director of the Canadian Pork Council, bringing over two decades of expertise in strategic communications, social media, public and government relations.

Prior to his current role, Stephen was a professor and coordinator at Algonquin College for the Public Relations program. Additionally, he also worked for the Minister of the New Brunswick Department of Finance, and has published a Canadian best-seller on media relations.

He has a wide variety of experience as an independent consultant and in senior roles in political offices in Canada and other positions, including Vice President of Communications at EDS Canada and Chief Operating Officer for NewsWatch.

With a passion for diversity in communications and a commitment to corporate social responsibility, Stephen continues to shape the landscape of the Canadian pork industry with his leadership.

Dr. Martyna Lagoda holds a B.A degree in Science, Zoology, and an M.Sc degree in Animal Behaviour and Welfare.

Following the completion of her Ph.D in Sow Welfare (focus on sow chronic stress and its implications for piglet prenatal stress) at Teagasc, Ireland in 2022, she worked as a research technologist on the “Tail Bite Advice” project, aiming to develop algorithms to accurately monitor tail biting behaviour, and to create a data-driven PLF decision support tool to actively advise farmers on how to reduce tail-biting occurrences.

Dr. Lagoda currently works as a Post-doctoral Research Fellow in the Swine Ethology and Welfare research group at the Western College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Saskatchewan.

Aligning closely with Dr. Lagoda’s interests, goals, and passions, the group deliver a program to enhance our understanding of pigs, to improve their welfare, and support sustainable swine farming practices.

Dr. Bobbie Lundquist is the acting Director of Emergency Preparedness for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. She received her DVM from the Western College of Veterinary Medicine (2000) and completed a Master of Science degree in Large Animal Clinical Sciences specializing in veterinary epidemiology in 2016 (WCVM).

During her 22 years with the CFIA she has worked at all levels, primarily in the Operational Branch of the Agency. Over the years, she has been engaged in federally reportable disease outbreaks such as: Anthrax, Chronic Wasting Disease in SK, AB & QC , Avian Influenza & Bovine Tuberculosis. More recently, Dr. Lundquist was deployed to and providing emergency support to CFIA’s response to multiple cases of high pathogenicity avian influenza in Canada.

She currently directs the CFIA’s Emergency Management Directorate which includes ASF Preparedness and oversight of the Preparedness Pillar in the ASF Pan-Canadian Action Plan.

Dr. Raj Sharma is currently a post-doctoral researcher in the department of Biological Systems Engineering at University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Dr. Sharma has a background in electrical and computer engineering and specializes in using signal processing and machine learning in multi-modal data streams to extract meaningful interpretations and insights. Dr. Sharma’s current research is in the in the field of precision animal management where the team is analyzing videos/images to detect lameness in sows and combining accelerometer data with images to analyze postures and activities.

Dr. Sharma and team have also developed RFID technology-based systems to analyze feeding and drinking behaviour in swine to monitor animal wellbeing and detect/predict illness.

Dr. Sharma is also an expert in using computer vision technologies utilizing colour, depth and point-cloud data to estimate weights and body condition scores in sows.

Dr. Leanne Van De Weyer received her formal education at the University of Saskatchewan, receiving a BSA, BEd, DVM, MSc (epi) back when an extended university education was more affordable.

Her real education took place during her 12 years of mixed animal practice and 15 years of animal health industry work focused on swine and cattle.

She has spent the last 10 years supporting the Zoetis Improvest team as a technical veterinarian and more recently as the national business manager.

Leanne and her husband Tony live in Weyburn SK. They have 2 grown children, a house that’s too big, and a section of land that’s too small without off-farm jobs.

Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Susan Watkins, is retired from the University of Arkansas System’s Division of Agriculture Cooperative Extension Service.

Dr. Watkins earned her PhD in poultry nutrition from the University of Arkansas before joining the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science faculty as an extension specialist.

During her 22 year career, she assisted the poultry industry all over the US and world with identifying, quantifying and correcting drinking water challenges.

Dr. Watkins also conducted nutritional supplement research, evaluated bedding materials, floor sanitation procedures, litter amendments for salmonella control and darkling beetle control.

She also taught poultry production and managed the internship program.

Jeremy is the Director of National Marketing with Canada Pork, with over a decade of experience in the meat industry.

Jeremy’s career began in meat protein sales, gaining valuable insights into the meat retail landscape. This foundation led him to work with a provincial pork association, where he engaged with retailers and foodservice businesses, ensuring their needs align with industry standards.

In addition, Jeremy collaborated closely with producers and processors, allowing him to grasp their unique challenges and aspirations. His tenure at a federal processor further enriched the understanding of the requirements of our Verified Canadian Pork (VCP) member, enabling him to create effective communication materials tailored to both VCP provincial association members and federal processor members.

He is passionate about bridging the gap between different stakeholders in the meat industry and fostering collaboration to support growth and innovation in the sector.

2024 Symposium Committee

Miles Beaudin - Hypor Inc. Kevin Brooks - Olymel

Lindsay Case - PIC Alain Dumuk - Sunhaven Farms

Mark Ferguson - Sask Pork Toby Tschetter - Star City Farming

Sarah Heppner - AcuFast Ravneet Kaur - Sask Pork

Steffen Klenk - PIC Brad Marceniuk - SK Ministry of Agriculture

Murray Pettitt - Prairie Swine Centre Jessica Podhordeski - Sask Pork

Steve Seto - Sask Pork Patty Riley - Sask Pork

Ken Friesen - Merck Animal Health Sheldon Friesen - Topigs Norsvin Canada

Dr. Coral Williams – Warman Vet Services