Confirmed cases of African swine fever in Germany continue to rise

Source: Xinhua| 2020-09-30 23:53:44|Editor: huaxia

BERLIN, Sept. 30 (Xinhua) -- The total number of confirmed cases of African swine fever (ASF) in wild boars in Germany has increased to 38 since the first ASF case was detected on Sept. 10, Germany's Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) announced on Wednesday.

The Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute (FLI), the Federal Research Institute for Animal Health, confirmed two more cases of ASF in wild boars found in the federal state Brandenburg near the border with Poland, according to BMEL.

One of the infected wild boar was found at a site outside the previously defined risk area. Brandenburg "must now adapt the existing protection zones and protective measures accordingly in order to prevent the further spread of the disease," BMEL stressed.

A crisis management team was established in the area where the infected wild boar was found, the Maerkisch-Oderland district announced on Tuesday and the construction of a mobile electric fence around the area was in preparation and would start on Wednesday.

"Five different teams are on the way," Thomas Berendt, spokesperson of the district, told the German Press Agency (dpa) on Wednesday. The electric fence is to be built over a length of 20 kilometers.

To prevent the risk of importing ASF into Germany, a solid wildlife fence was built on the border with Poland, the federal state Brandenburg announced last week.

The domestic pig population in Germany was still free from ASF, a disease not dangerous for humans, BMEL noted.

Nevertheless, Germany's pig farmers were "of course severely affected by the trade restrictions and the associated drop in prices," market expert Matthias Quaing of the association of pig farmers in Germany (ISN) told Xinhua on Wednesday.

"We hope that ways can be found to make the export of pork to Asia possible again, for example by excluding individual regions or agricultural enterprises from the export possibilities," added Quaing.

Before ASF was detected in Germany, China had become the country's "most important trading partner" for pork exports in the first half (H1) of the year, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) announced two weeks ago.

Between January and June, 233,300 tons of pork were exported to China, accounting for 26.8 percent of Germany's total pork exports, more than doubled compared with the same period of last year, Destatis noted. Enditem

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