The Battle Over Epidemic Prevention and Food Waste 02"Pig Farmers' Civil War: Feeding Food Waste to Pigs Is High-Risk and Outdated VS Food Waste Can Be Sorted More Carefully in Addition to High-Temperature Boiling
Series Preface: African swine fever prevention has ignited a "civil war" within the domestic pig farming industry. Because food waste is one of the transmission routes for the disease, there are highly divided opinions within the pig sector over whether to ban feeding food waste to pigs and over the industry's development prospects. This is the second of four articles in the series. To read the other articles, please click here.
Taiwan Pig Farmers Youth Alliance: Banning Food Waste Is for Short-Term Epidemic Prevention and Long-Term Elimination of Outdated Practices
The issue of "feeding food waste to pigs" has been fiercely debated. After the central government launched feed subsidies and livestock exit subsidies on December 24 last year, and then Yunlin County (December 25, 2018), Kinmen County (January 10, 2019) and Hualien County (January 10, 2019) also prohibited all pig farms within their jurisdictions from feeding food waste, the war between feed-feeding pig farmers and food-waste-feeding pig farmers was declared underway.
The Council of Agriculture convened an expert meeting and concluded that as long as food waste is boiled at high temperature, concerns about disease transmission can be eliminated. But most pig farmers who raise white pigs on feed are not reassured by this answer. The "Taiwan Pig Farmers Youth Alliance" is demanding, through social networks, petitions and other means, that the rights of pig farmers who feed pigs with feed, accounting for 88%, be taken seriously, and that food waste be fully banned in order to protect Taiwan's pigs.
Kuo Chia-yu, chairman of the "Taiwan Pig Farmers Youth Alliance", said that banning food waste is needed in the short term for epidemic prevention, while in the long term it is meant to promote transformation of the livestock industry. He explained that although boiled food waste poses no transmission risk, "what is worrying is that when operators go to collect food waste and then cook it at home, their bodies, hands and feet may accidentally come into contact with raw food waste, which would indirectly create a source of infection."
