The Belison Multi-Purpose Cooperative (MPC) is a recipient of PHP10 million aid under the Integrated National Swine Production Initiatives for Recovery and Expansion (INSPIRE) program of the Department of Agriculture.

Salvador Estaris, Belison MPC chief executive officer, said they would use the fund to construct a breeding facility with artificial insemination (AI) laboratory and to procure the initial 30 sows and one boar for breeding in Barangay Tamayok, Patnongon.

The project will support the hog repopulation program in Antique after its swine inventory suffered due to African swine fever (ASF).

Available data at the Antique Provincial Veterinarian (ProVet) showed 8,481 swine mortalities in the province due to ASF as of Jan. 15.

“We hope to be able to start the construction of the breeding facility with AI laboratory by next month,” he said in an interview.

Antique ProVet Public Health Division chief Dr. Marco Rafael Ardamil said the Belison MPC is one of the two cooperatives in the province identified as beneficiaries of the INSPIRE program in 2023.

“Under DA’s INSPIRE program, the cooperative will have to disperse 30 percent of its piglet produced within a year for free to the community,” he said.

The remaining 70 percent is up for dispersal to the market, with its members getting an income through their dividends at the end of the year.

The project will use the large white or landrace breeds that could produce more than 20 piglets in a year.

“Semen produced through the AI will also be sold to interested breeders,” Ardamil said.

AI, he said, is a more efficient way of producing semen from the boar, and it no longer entails swine transport.,

The cooperative with around 6,800 members, as its counterpart, provided the site for the project. (PNA)