The Rural Voice, 2006-06, Page 25know (answers to) those questions
yet."
At the heritage breeds meeting
some people felt if they bought some
Berkshire genetics and bred it to their
regular sows they could claim they
had Berkshire pork, Gingerich
recalls, but it was made clear that to
deal with the high end restaurants,
it's going to take more than slapping
a Berkshire label on a product.
There's going to need to be a branded
product with pedigreed traceability.
Commercial producers are also
showing an interest, he says.
"We have a variety of different
perspectives," he says. "We have
people who are selling pigs to the
Chinese market that want to use
Berkshire. We have people who are
trying to retail meat themselves — to
differentiate it."
One of the points was the rare
breeds meeting was
difference between
"commodity" pork and a
differentiated product. ,
There are also hobby farmers who
want meat for their own freezer.
"They are totally different customers.
says Gingerich. "There's Tots of
different examples of what that
Berkshire -semen user looks like."
"At this point it's a little bit
fledgling, but we sense that there's
enough of a user base there for us to
be interested in it."
"I guess I was encouraged by the
number of people that Ontario Pork
had show interest in that meeting. If
six people had showed up I would
have said 'this is not going
anywhere'. But there were big
commercial herds there, there were
the tried and true Berkshire breeders.
"There are people who are selling
Berkshire pork into high-end
restaurants in Toronto and Niagara -
on -the -Lake. This (market) already
exists today, but it's becoming more
popular."
Of course those who have
pioneered this market are worried
that the influx of a bunch of new players
might quickly fill the niche market.
"There's the balance between
production and demand and which k
going to lead which.
There are many factors in what it
takes to make producing pork
profitable. This latest experiment t,
just one more attempt to cover as
many bases as possible.0
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