China

WH Group shuts down one of its plants due to an ASF outbreak

Safety & Legislation

Chinese pork producer WH Group was forced to shut down its operations at one of its major slaughterhouses after it detected an outbreak of African Swine Fever (ASF).

Posted on Aug 21 ,10:28

WH Group shuts down one of its plants due to an ASF outbreak

The People's Government of Zhengzhou Municipality has ordered the producer to temporarily close its facility for a period of six weeks starting from August 16, 2018.

This was the second case of ASF found in Zhengzhou of Henan province on August 14, when 30 hogs were reported dead out of a cart of 260 live hogs which were all supplied by an independent supplier to WH's Zhengzhou Slaughtering Factory. The company was forced to cull all of its animals at its slaughtering facility.

The group said in a statement that the temporary closure of the Zhengzhou Slaughtering Factory was part of the epidemic prevention and control measures of the People’s Government of Zhengzhou Municipality. In light of the detection of African swine fever, Zhengzhou Shuanghui has taken active steps in order to prevent further spread of the swine disease including, among other things, setting up of a specialized body, euthanizing all live hogs at the Zhengzhou Slaughtering Factory and temporarily closing down the Zhengzhou Slaughtering Factory.

The group announced that no other cases of African swine fever or other epidemic swine disease have been detected at its other slaughtering factories.

Furthermore, WH Group said the operation of Zhengzhou Shuanghui only accounts for an insignificant portion of the entire operation of the Group and there will not be any disruption of the supply of pork and related products as a result of the temporary closure of the Zhengzhou Slaughtering Factory.

According to Bloomberg, on Monday, WH Group's shares fell as much as 7%.

The Chinese authorities have recently reported that a third case of ASF on Sunday. Bloomberg reports that this may be a cause of concern regarding the need to toughen inspection of meat imports. The outbreak was found in the eastern province of Jiangsu. The Chinese Ministry of Agriculture announced that it is investigating whether the ASF cases are related.

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