The pork industry in the U.S. is getting ready to release a volunteer “contact tracing” program for hogs that the industry hopes would stave off an export and supply crisis should a viral disease for swine show up in the U.S.
As the global pork industry watches Germany from afar, the U.S. Pork Checkoff has focused attention on ways to enable regional pork sales and provide the tools necessary for state and federal veterinarians to keep hogs and pork moving should a disease such as African swine fever (ASF) hit the U.S. as well.
The National Pork Board in early November will roll out a new software program called AgView, created through checkoff dollars, that will work with pork producers, USDA and state veterinarians to track hog movement from farms to processing plants. AgView would essentially operate like contact tracing for pigs.
Secure database for privacy
Privacy has often been a concern among producers entering records into a shared database. Bill Even, CEO of the pork board, said the program itself would not be controlled by the checkoff, but held by an outside third party in a secure database. Producers would enter their swine herds and movements using their premise ID numbers, because the industry moves its animals in groups.
ASF globally has been a game-changer. The disease is both highly infectious and deadly to swine, though it poses no risk to human health in the food supply. Still, a single case can paralyze and decimate a country’s hog industry.
If there is a foreign animal disease such as African swine fever diagnosed in the U.S., producers could go into AgView and immediately give their permission to share movement information with their state veterinarians. This ability will accelerate the process of determining where hogs have been, what has been their movement and if the hog herd might have come into contact with any infected animals. It will help state and federal veterinarians speed up the release of quarantines and movement of pigs that show no contacts in infected areas.
“If I can show animal health officials I’ve got negative tests for African swine fever, and my pig flow movements are not in the area that’s being impacted, I may be able to more quickly request the essential release from the government to say I can move my pigs,” Even said.
How to sign up
To sign up for a free account on AgView.com, producers will want to talk to their veterinarians about the records that they have. As a voluntary program, it will rely heavily on producers signing up for the program and entering their information, said Dave Pyburn, chief veterinarian with the pork board.
“Without producer data voluntarily entered into this system, it will do us no good,” Pyburn said. “And the more producer data there is, the stronger case we will have to make—one, for restarting domestic movements and then, two, getting back into that global regionalized trade.”
What this builds up to is that a robust industry database in AgView provides the ability to demonstrate to major trading partners such as China, Japan, Mexico, Canada and South Korea— which make up about 85 percent of U.S. pork exports—that pork plants are receiving hogs from regions where no positive ASF cases have been discovered. U.S. trade officials would push the case for reopening U.S. pork trade on a regional basis or specific packing plants to get trade moving again.
“The quicker we can get pork moving back into commerce and provide assurances to our trading partners, the less financial pressure would be applied to our industry,” Even said. “Ultimately, the National Pork Board, USDA, state vets and producers will all need to work together for the benefit of the pork industry.”
Avoiding national bans
Going a step further would be to avoid immediate outright national bans. At the moment, countries make regionalization approvals on a case-by-case basis, which happened for the poultry industry during the avian influenza outbreak in 2015. Even said the pork industry would like to see the U.S. work on regional agreements before any possible outbreak.
“What we really need is to provide the scientific basis that allows the trade negotiators to build out our regional agreements with our key trading partners,” Even said.
Germany has found at least 49 cases of ASF in its feral hogs since the first announcement Sept. 10. All of the cases in the country have been wild hogs near the Polish border—away from Germany’s major pork-production region. Still, China immediately banned German pork, which accounted for 18 percent of German’s pork exports in 2019, and 30 percent of export sales during the first five months of this year, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.
“It you look at what happened in Germany, literally within 24 hours, their industry lost over a $1 billion from the finding at the time from one wild boar in far eastern Germany, and they did not have it in their commercial herd,” Even said. “But their pork producers have now taken a terrible financial beating.” — Chris Clayton, DTN Ag policy editor
