Artificial Insemination in Pigs: Current Trends and Future Prospects

Pig is one of the efficient feed converting animals amongst the domestic livestock and can play an important role in improving economic status of the weaker section of the society. Pig is one of the most important livestock reared by rural people specially the tribal mass of India. Pork is the most preferred meat consumed North East India but there is huge gap between the demand and supply of the pork. This is because the pig population is declining due to more consumption and lack of superior males for breeding to multiply the population. Low pork yield /indigenous pig, unavailability of semen/males at farmers’ door step, lack of multiplier farms/farmers and tendency to rear on zero input basis are major hurdles in the pig production in the country. The goals and solution for augmenting pig production should be maximized number of live piglets per litter, optimizes piglet birth weight, maximizes litters per year, reducing weaning to oestrus interval, optimizes longevity & lifetime productivity. In such a situation, Artificial insemination provides the best solution. The technique is first generation and oldest reproductive biotechnology for fastest genetic improvement which has reached to the farmer’s door step. A.I. is used worldwide across the world, for which the status of A.I. is described ahead in the present paper. However, A.I. in pigs is still in infancy stage. As per recent livestock censuses, consecutive decline trends have been observed in pig population across the country. But a rise in pig population has been observed in Assam state that is mainly use of A.I. in this state as compare to others. Performing artificial insemination in pig is very simple as compare to cattle and buffalo. Artificial insemination in pigs is mainly done using liquid semen while A.I. with frozen-thawed semen is still in infancy stage. Currently, more than 99% of inseminations conducted worldwide are made with liquid stored semen at 15-20ºC for 0-5 days, where more than 85% of all inseminations are carried out on the day of collection or on the following day (within 24 hr. of semen collection) for meat production market. Less than 1% of all inseminations are made with cryopreserved semen for upgrading the genetic nucleus in a particular country or herd. In the present article, AI in pig will be mainly focused using liquid semen.