For the most part, technical efficiency is increasing on profit monitor pig farms, according to the Teagasc national pig herd performance report 2025.

The data is taken from pig farms that used the Teagasc profit monitor recording system during 2025, analysing data from 85 herds, representing more than 74,500 sows, equating to around 55% of the total Irish sow herd.

The herd sizes in the database vary from less than 100 sows to more than 2,500 sows, with an average herd size of 880 sows.

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To make allowance for this large range in herd sizes, Teagasc weighted the performance parameters based on herd size.

In 2025, the number of pigs born per litter continued to rise, with 15.43 pigs born alive per litter, an increase of 0.1 on 2024 figures. This is a major key performance indicator in sow performance.

On average, each sow had 2.23 litters last year, producing 28.4 pigs in the 12-month period, which is an increase on the 2024 figure of 27.8 pigs per year.

Pigs were finished at 119.5kg liveweight and 91.3kg deadweight on average for 2025. This is a slight decrease on 2024, when the averages were 119.7kg and 91.7kg respectively.

Each sow produced an average of 2,593kg pig meat in 2025, using 8,980kg of feed, an increase on the amount of pigmeat produced in 2024. This means that for each kilogramme of meat produced in 2025, 3.46kg of feed was required. This figure has decreased on previous years, indicating that efficiency is increasing.

Feed conversion

Feed conversion efficiency (FCE) weaning to sale in 2025 was 2.36. The FCE refers to how many kilogrammes of feed is required to produce 1kg of liveweight gain. This figure is continuing to go in the right direction and has been decreasing for three consecutive years, according to the report.

In terms of on-farm costs, healthcare costs increased by 0.9c compared with 2024. Labour and management costs, as well as heat, power, light and transport costs, also increased on 2024.

Teagasc advises that every farm monitors its own production costs and benchmark their herd performance on the profit monitor system, which allows each farm to compare their performance figures with the figures shown and increase efficiency in their system.