Center for Poultry & Livestock Excellence Funding Opportunities
The Center for Poultry and Livestock Excellence, created under the 2019 PA Farm Bill and funded at $1 million each year from 2019-2022, supports the animal ag industry with biosecurity planning and disease prevention, processing capacity, and food safety and quality assurance.
The intent of the center is to focus on poultry, swine, lamb, sheep and goat needs across the commonwealth. Key areas of focus include: Biosecurity Planning; Animal Agriculture Infrastructure; Research; Food Safety & Quality Assurance.
Uses:
Activities and research projects to enhance biosecurity, diagnostic testing, veterinary telemedicine and other strategies to prevent, detect and manage animal diseases and protect the food supply.
Funding:
Biosecurity:
- Developing innovative methods to manage disease outbreaks in humane, safe, practical and efficient ways in large-scale livestock and poultry operations;
- Practical biosecurity implementation for commercial and backyard domestic livestock operations, recognizing threats such operations face from wildlife and inherent risks operations pose to each other;
- Increasing diagnostic tools available through the Pennsylvania Animal Diagnostic Laboratory System to support food-animal production with focus on enhanced methods to detect, differentiate and manage pathogens;
- Development, training and opportunities for food animal veterinarians to explore the capability of remote telemedicine to address challenges of supporting livestock health and animal productivity in rural Pennsylvania;
- Studying various culturally-based live-animal sale practices to improve disease traceability in custom-butchered animals; and
- Solicitation of industry input on specific diseases to identify and estimate the economic impact on PA food-animal operations.
Industry Analysis:
- SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) Analysis of Pennsylvania animal agriculture, including small ruminants, swine, poultry, dairy and beef. Complete statewide analysis with regional subsection findings to assist in identifying economic impact, environment footprint, regional challenges, and areas of growth for animal health and food safety.
Additional funds are allotted for sponsorship of events with a statewide impact with the goal of enhancing poultry, swine, lamb, sheep and goat production. Those interested in being considered for sponsorship should complete the center's online form.