7000 pigs to die on one farm
2005-04-14
Malané Bosman
THE devastation of blue ear pig disease struck a major piggery at Klapmuts two weeks after a burglary and theft and 7000 pigs must be put down.
“It might be coincidence,” owner Mike Heramb of Uitzig said this week. “But that is exactly the gestation period of the disease.”
Contrary to the belief that the virus spreads through air, direct contact is necessary. Had the burglars been wearing boots covered in manure from affected pigs, the disease could easily have been brought to Uitzig.
Other farmers sympathised with Heramb, chairman of the Pork Producers Association.
“Mike has one of the cleanest and most hygienic and secure piggeries in the country. It is a great loss for him.”
Says Heramb: “It is not only the financial loss, but also the emotional trauma of having to destroy our 7000 pigs.”
Uitzig will be out of production for at least six months after the quarantine has been lifted, with an estimated loss of R1 million.
“But this is the only way. We are trying to eradicate the virus in the Western Cape and prevent it from spreading to the rest of the country.
“We have to start with a clean slate.”
The Ministry of Agriculture has put up funding of R3 million for the eradication of pigs belonging to emerging farmers in the area.
Healthy pigs will then be made available to these farmers by the pork industry.
Pigs on more than 80 sites in the Boland have tested positive to the disease since the start of the outbreak in March, in sties used by informal farmers.
Heramb’s Uitzig is the only major piggery affected.
Consumption of meat from sick pigs is not harmful to humans. It causes respiratory problems only in pigs, with sows aborting or giving birth to premature or still-born litters.
The implementation of permit control on the movement of pigs in the Boland has been extended in an effort to curb the spread of blue ear disease.
The movement restriction now covers the area from Gordon’s Bay along the Hottentots Mountains, Du Toit’s Kloof to Gouda and up to Velddrif.
The Cape Metropole is also included in the area where a transport permit from a State Veterinarian is needed.
There is a ban on the sale of live pigs at auctions in the Boland, while pigs from affected farms remain under quarantine and can only be taken for slaughter at an abattoir under cover of a permit.
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