Pig farming

 Pig farming in Malawi

In Malawi the livestock sector is one of the growing sectors, however it is not growing enough to meet the demand of the country. Malawi stands to benefit a lot from the livestock sector especially pig farming. As the human population increases the demand for livestock also increases since it is used for food purposes. Pig farming is one of the profitable livestock production in Malawi because they have easy building up flocks and also have quick returns on the investments. As the sector continues to grow pig farming will play an important role in increasing the economy of Malawi as well as promoting food security despite having some religious taboos, thereby increasing income for small holder farmers. 

However pig farming is highly adopted by many farmers in Malawi both commercial and subsistence farmers, this is because pigs have a high growth rate, fast at increasing their flock size this is so because the sows produce more piglets and that they are able to reach the market weight in 5 months’ time. Pigs also do not require a large space to raise them, on the other hand they do not require much inputs on the feeds since they are tolerant to a wide variety of feeds.

There are different meat products that can be consumed from the pigs; firstly pork which is consumed and liked by most people, it contains the fresh meat from young pigs of age 3 to 4 months, secondly bacon which is the processed meat that is soaked in sodium chloride usually taken from heavy pigs and contains more fats than lean meat, moreover ham which is meat cut from the carcass and it contains more lean meat which is then cured and smoked, lastly cutter which is the meat mainly used in sausages and pork pies taken from culled breeding animals.

Therefore Malawi, has some breeds that are commonly raised by farmers; firstly landrace which are characterised by their dropping ears and a straight snout, secondly large white which have erect ears and a slightly dished face, additionally indigenous pigs are also raised, lastly tristar which is a cross breed pig developed from the exotic breeds large white, landrace and duroc.