Canadian farmers had 11.8 million hogs on their farms as of April 1, up 1.4% from the same date in 2010, despite a 3.5% reduction in the number of hog operations, according to Statistics Canada.
Sow inventories remained unchanged from April 1, 2010, at 1.3 million head. In addition, farmers anticipated no significant changes in the number of sows expected to farrow during the second and third quarters of 2011.
Approximately 5.5 million hogs were slaughtered during the first quarter, down 2.8% from a year earlier, and 1.4 million hogs were exported, down 3.6% from the same period in 2010.