Careful with the pork you import! 🥓

With all the fuss that African swine fever (ASF) has been generating across mainland Europe lately, Great Britain has announced new strict measures to control the movement of pork and related products. They come into force today (on September 1).

• Since no vaccine is available, the virus is a significant threat to British pig herds and pork trade, and thus, keeping it at bay is key.

It will no longer be legal to bring pork or pork products from any country outside of the EU into the UK. As for EU and EFTA countries, individuals must not bring in more than two kilograms unless they are produced with EU commercial production standards. However, commercial imports remain unaffected.  

• The justification is a new risk assessment, which claims that Great Britain is at “medium risk” and that the most likely way the virus could be introduced is by a member of the public bringing it in from an ASF-affected country. 
• The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Biosecurity Minister, Lord Richard Benyon, says that an ASF outbreak is the greatest threat the industry faces today and everyone going in or out of the UK must abide by the new rules. 

The virus is a major concern because a single outbreak would both harm relations with trading partners and threaten the livelihoods of thousands of pig farmers.

• Other steps that people, farmers, and the food industry can take is disposing of leftovers or food waste in secure bins that pigs or wildlife cannot access, as well as adopting high biosecurity standards.