The proposing organisation
O.P.A.S. (Pig Breeders Product Organization) is the largest pork meat product organization in Italy and represents 12% of Italian pig farming. OPAS raises heavy and intermediate pigs by planning and diversifying supply chains in favor of the demands of commercial distribution. It develops its business mainly in the slaughter and sale of pigs conferred by the members (who are obliged to confer at least 75% of their production according to Community legislation of product organizations). OPAS members come from Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna, Piedmont, Veneto and Marche, regions notoriously with a livestock vocation in Italy. OPAS carries out its activities in the Carpi (MO) plant. The numbers – 75 farms with an average farm size of 30,000 pigs and 70 cultivated hectares, a sow park represented by over 50,000 sows out of a national total of 417,000, the average fertility per sow is 25 piglets, single genetic center, pig feeding by members is standardized dry according to dop specification (corn, wheat, barley and soy, with 60 per cent self-produced and 40 per cent purchased by OPAS in Italy), own laboratory for analysis of quality certification of raw materials, located in 5 regions, 1,500.000 pigs reared every year, 50 audits per year by certification bodies, 650 employees. Three quarters of the national heritage is concentrated in just 4 regions of the Po Valley, Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, Piedmont, and Veneto, and raise pigs in about 12,000 farms. In this area, the average size of the companies associated with OPAS is considerably larger than the national average. Also, at the provincial level there are 5 areas of greater interest: Mantua with 1,260,000 head, Brescia with 1,171,000 head, Cremona with 785,000 head, Reggio Emilia with 384,000 head and Parma with 167,000 head.