Objectives

Newly-born piglets have very little iron storage, but they need iron to sustain their rapid growth. Sow`s milk is poor in iron, and before weaning, most of the piglets eat too little solid cereal-based feed to satisfy their biological iron needs. To avoid any risk of deficiency, piglets in conventional pig farming are supplemented with a high dose of iron administered during the first days of life, usually in the form of an intra-muscular injection. In organic farming, the use of medication must be limited to its minimum, and there is a debate whether iron injection should be considered or not as an allopathic treatment. A study within the CORE Organic Cofund project POWER took a closer look at this issue.