Scale Difference from the Impact of Disease Control on Pig Production Efficiency

Abstract

Epidemic disease prevention plays a critical role in ensuring the healthy development of livestock farming, and the subjective willingness of breeders can be affected by the cost of epidemic disease prevention. To correct the misconception that farmers regard the cost of disease control as an ineffective cost, and to promote the healthy development of the pig breeding industry, our study employed the data envelopment analysis super-efficiency model and panel threshold regression model to evaluate the combination of the cost of epidemic disease prevention and swine productivity using data collected from 1998–2018 across 30 provinces in China. The following results were obtained. (1) The cost of epidemic disease prevention generated a non-linear on swine productivity when the swine farming scale was limited; (2) When the number of animals at the beginning of the year was less than 6.0002, swine productivity was impacted negatively; (3) When the number of animals at the beginning of the year ranged between 6.0002 and 12.9994, the impact was insignificant; (4) A strong correlation was observed between the expenses of epidemic disease prevention and animal productivity when the number of animals at the beginning of the year exceeded 12.9994. These results indicate that publicity should be enhanced to elucidate the combination of epidemic disease prevention and swine productivity among breeders. In addition, the government should introduce relevant policies to encourage the development of large-scale pig farming, such as subsidies for the construction of large-scale farms and insurance.