O.P.A.S. (Pig Breeders Product Organization) is the largest product organization in Italy and represents 12% of Italian pig farming, able to breed heavy and medium pigs by planning and diversifying supply chain supplies in favor of commercial distribution requests. It develops the activity principally in the slaughtering and sale of pigs conferred by the partners (who are obliged to confer at least 75% of their production according to the Community regulation of product organizations). OPAS members come from Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna, Piedmont, Veneto and Marche, regions known to be Italy’s livestock vocation. OPAS carries out its activities in the Carpi (MO) plant.
Numbers – 75 farms with an average farm size of 30 thousand pigs and 70 hectares cultivated, a sow park represented by over 50 thousand sows out of a national total of 417 thousand, fertility for the average sow 25 piglets, a unique genetic center, feeding of pigs of associates dry standardized according to dop regulations (corn, wheat, soy barley, with 60 per cent self-produced and 40 per cent purchased by Opas in Italy and abroad with land contracting and coverage of cereal prices through the use of futures markets), in-house analysis laboratory for the certification of raw materials quality, 5 regions, 1,500,000 pigs bred each year, 50 audits a year by certification bodies, 560 employees.
In just 4 regions of the Po Valley, Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, Piedmont and Veneto, three-quarters of the national heritage is concentrated, which is raised in about 12,000 companies. In this area the average size of the companies associated with OPAS is considerably higher than the national average. Even at the provincial level there are 5 areas of greatest interest: Mantua with 1,260,000 heads, Brescia with 1,171,000 heads, Cremona with 785,000 heads, Reggio Emilia with 384,000 heads and Parma with 167,000 heads. This means that OPAS with over one million commercialized pigs represents 12% of the national pig production.
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