Unfortunately, Vietnam is confronting a serious problem – the African Swine. Because of this, they killed around 10% of its pigs for containing the swine that started to hit on a large scale the industrial farms. The first outbreaks happened at small households farms, but, unfortunately, they are beginning to occur at more extensive industrial operation now. An example is Phu Son Farm from Dong Nai province from Ho Chi Minh City.
The problem with the African swine is severe and worrying because the farms are having hundreds of pigs each. The Government is saying that with this number of animals, the damages are significant. The African swine fever is a deadly disease for pigs, and fortunately, harmless to humans. The fever was detected for the first time in Vietnam, in February, and the spreading increased to farms in 60 out of 63 provinces.
However, the Deputy Head of Vietnam’s Department of Animal Health, Bach Duc Luu, says that the authorities are killing hundreds of pigs in Phu Son Farm, which means around 18.000 pigs. Besides this, no representative of the Phu Son Farm, owned by Phu Son Livestock Joint Stock Co, commented on the fact. Phu Son Farm is one of the oldest from Vietnam, founded in 1976, and it’s supplying pork for the Dong Nai province and Ho Chi Minh City.
Besides this, the United National Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) had advice Vietnam to declare a national emergency, but the Government said last week that they don’t consider doing that. Vietnam killed more than 2.8 million pigs this week from 2.5 million pigs from the previous week. More bad news can come if it rains. The rain will spread the virus further.
Finally, the African swine fever started last year in China, who is the largest pork producer, and Vietnam’s pork industry has a value of $ 4.03 billion, which means 10% of the agricultural sector.
As our second lead editor, Anna C. Mackinno provides guidance on the stories Great Lakes Ledger reporters cover. She has been instrumental in making sure the content on the site is clear and accurate for our readers. If you see a particularly clever title, you can likely thank Anna. Anna received a BA and and MA from Fordham University.