U.S. pork producers have a long tradition of social responsibility. The tradition
includes the development of producer certification programs that producers can use
to ensure that U.S. pork products are of the highest quality and safe, and that
the animals raised for food are cared for in a way that ensures their well-being.
In 1989, pork producers developed the Pork Quality Assurance© program, a producer
education and certification program to reduce the risk of violative animal health
product residues in pork.
The program, better known as PQA, was modeled after the Hazard Analysis Critical
Control Point (HACCP) programs used by food manufacturers to ensure the safety of
food products, but customized for on-farm use. PQA was designed to identify the
practices with potential to result in a food safety hazard and minimize this potential
risk through producer education on relevant on-farm practices.
The success of the program was demonstrated by significant producer participation,
customer acceptance and more importantly, a measurable reduction in the instances
of violative residues in pork. The program was revised repeatedly, approximately
every 5 years, with updated content taken from new scientific knowledge, and to
address the evolving industry and changing production practices.
As consumers show greater interest in the attributes of the products they purchase
for food, their interest in the wellbeing of the animals raised by pork producers
has come to the forefront. Producers understand this and since the mid- 1990s have
had programs and educational materials in place to help them care for their animals
in a manner that promotes animal well-being.
In 2007, PQA evolved into PQA Plus© to reflect increasing customer and consumer
interest in the way food animals are raised. PQA Plus was built as a continuous
improvement program. Maintaining its food safety tradition to ensure that U.S. pork
products continue to be recognized domestically and internationally as the highest
quality and safest available, it also provides information to ensure producers can
measure, track and continuously improve animal wellbeing. With PQA Plus, pork producers
have another tool to demonstrate that they are socially responsible.
The PQA Plus program achieves its goals through:
- Producer training by a certified PQA Plus advisor which results in the producer
receiving PQA Plus certification
- An objective assessment of on-farm animal well-being which, when combined with the
education of the producer through PQA Plus certification, results in the farm receiving
PQA Plus site status.
- A PQA Plus survey designed to evaluate the implementation of PQA Plus in the industry.
Survey results are used to identify opportunities for improvement of the program's
information and delivery.
This site is maintained on behalf of National Pork Board by QCI, an independent
third-party administrator of the online assessment portion of the PQA Plus program.
National Pork Board does not maintain this site and does not have access to information
submitted into this site.
If you are looking to submit site assessment data, please go to
Pork.org to log in.
Find out more information on the PQA Plus program, on the
Pork.org website.