By Agence France-Presse
The number of dead pigs found in a river running through China’s commercial hub Shanghai has reached more than 13,000, state media said Monday, as mystery deepened over the hogs’ precise origin.
Shanghai had pulled 9,460 pigs out of the Huangpu river, which supplies 22 percent of the city’s drinking water, since the infestation began earlier this month, the Shanghai Daily reported.
Shanghai has blamed farmers in Jiaxing in neighbouring Zhejiang province for dumping pigs which died of disease into the river upstream, where the official Xinhua news agency said another 3,601 dead animals had been recovered so far.
The Jiaxing government has said the area is not the sole source of the carcasses, adding it had found only one producer that could be held responsible.
Shanghai said it had checked farms in its southwestern district of Songjiang, where the pigs were first detected, but found they were not to blame, the Shanghai Daily said.
The scandal has spotlighted China’s troubles with food safety, adding the country’s most popular meat to a growing list of food items rocked by controversy.
Samples of the dead pigs have tested positive for porcine circovirus, a common swine disease that does not affect humans.
“Due to some farming households having a weak recognition of the law, bad habits, and lack of increased supervision and capability for treatment have led to the situation,” the national agriculture ministry’s chief veterinarian Yu Kangzhen said.
Yu attributed a higher mortality rate among pigs to colder weather this spring, though he ruled out an epidemic, the ministry said in statement posted on its website over the weekend.
Read more at - http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/18/dead-pigs-in-chinas-shanghai-river-now-exceed-13000/
Shanghai had pulled 9,460 pigs out of the Huangpu river, which supplies 22 percent of the city’s drinking water, since the infestation began earlier this month, the Shanghai Daily reported.
Shanghai has blamed farmers in Jiaxing in neighbouring Zhejiang province for dumping pigs which died of disease into the river upstream, where the official Xinhua news agency said another 3,601 dead animals had been recovered so far.
Shanghai said it had checked farms in its southwestern district of Songjiang, where the pigs were first detected, but found they were not to blame, the Shanghai Daily said.
The scandal has spotlighted China’s troubles with food safety, adding the country’s most popular meat to a growing list of food items rocked by controversy.
Samples of the dead pigs have tested positive for porcine circovirus, a common swine disease that does not affect humans.
“Due to some farming households having a weak recognition of the law, bad habits, and lack of increased supervision and capability for treatment have led to the situation,” the national agriculture ministry’s chief veterinarian Yu Kangzhen said.
Yu attributed a higher mortality rate among pigs to colder weather this spring, though he ruled out an epidemic, the ministry said in statement posted on its website over the weekend.
Read more at - http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/18/dead-pigs-in-chinas-shanghai-river-now-exceed-13000/
