ASF China: 1st Outbreaks in Guangxi and Shandong
In the week that Vietnam reported its 1st outbreaks of African Swine Fever, the news broke as well that the virus had reached 2 of the last non-infected provinces on the Chinese east coast: Guangdong province and Guangxi autonomous region.
Both areas are the 27th and 28th in China to be affected by ASF. In addition, it means that all coastal provinces from north to south now at least reported 1 outbreak of the virus ever since ASF was first detected in China in August 2018.
In total, on the basis of figures shared by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the total amount of pigs that was on farms found with ASF is 460,000. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) already 950,000 pigs had to be culled in an attempt to hold the spread. According to recent official figures, China is home to 461 million pigs.
ASF outbreak in Shandong province
The outbreak in Shandong province does not come unexpected, as there had been rumours for some while about allegedly infected meat packages coming from this province. The Chinese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs (MARA) reported on 20 February that the virus had been found on a farm in Laiwu district of Jinan City. The facility had 4,504 pigs, of which 17 had contracted the virus and 3 had died.
ASF outbreak in Guangxi autonomous region
With regard to the outbreak in Guangxi autonomous region, reported on the 19th of February, MARA shared that it had found the virus on 2 farming communities with in total 23,555 pigs. In total 924 animals had been killed by the virus.
The distance between the Guangxi outbreak and the affected Vietnamese provinces near Hanoi is between 300 and 350 km, measured in a straight line.
Food company recalls pork dumplings
News agency Reuters also reported that major Chinese frozen food producer Sanquan Food recently informed that it had recalled products that might have been contaminated with ASF. This happened after media reports about some of its dumplings testing positive for the virus.
Read more about growing patterns of pork consumption in China in this analysis
Sanquan said in a statement to the Shenzhen stock exchange that it has recalled all products suspected of contamination, citing reports of contamination in 3 batches of pork dumplings. The company said it is cooperating with local authorities on an investigation into the reports.
Reuters mentioned that Sanquan had not confirmed or denied the reports in the statement.
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