EU Toughens Rules on Imports in Response to PEDv

May 12, 2014

European Union officials on Tuesday agreed on new rules for the treatment of imported pigs’ blood for use in animal feed, but decided against changing the rules on importing live pigs even though a deadly virus has caused major losses to the U.S. pig industry.

In a statement, the European Commission said import rules on live animals were already very strict and the U.S. and Canadian authorities had told them no live pigs were scheduled to be sent to the EU.

But it said an expert committee had introduced a requirement that any blood products to be imported to the EU for use in pig feed must have been treated at 80 F, followed by storage for six weeks at room temperature, which the Commission said would ensure any coronavirus present was inactivated.

It also said the Commission would continue to review the situation and its expert committee would meet again early in June.

France had said it was considering a unilateral ban on imports of pigs and pig byproducts from the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Japan.

But it later said it would wait until after Tuesday’s meeting in Brussels to take a decision.

A spokeswoman confirmed France would not introduce a separate ban.

– Reporting for Reuters by Barbara Lewis and Sybille de la Hamaide.

Source: AASV

Video: Making budget friendly pig feed on a small livestock farm

I am going to show you how we save our farm money by making our own pig feed. It's the same process as making our cattle feed just with a slight adjustment to our grinder/ mixer that makes all the difference. We buy all the feed stuff required to make the total mix feed. Run each through the mixer and at the end of the process we have a product that can be consumed by our pigs.

I am the 2nd generation to live on this property after my parents purchased it in 1978. As a child my father hobby farmed pigs for a couple years and ran a vegetable garden. But we were not a farm by any stretch of the imagination. There were however many family dairy farms surrounding us. So naturally I was hooked with farming since I saw my first tractor. As time went on, I worked for a couple of these farms and that only fueled my love of agriculture. In 2019 I was able to move back home as my parents were ready to downsize and I was ready to try my hand at farming. Stacy and logan share the same love of farming as I do. Stacy growing up on her family's dairy farm and logans exposure of farming/tractors at a very young age. We all share this same passion to grow a quality/healthy product to share with our community. Join us on this journey and see where the farm life takes us.