The Philippines Department of Agriculture has included North Korea on the list of countries that ban the import of domestic and wild pigs, as well as other pork products, due to reports of African swine fever infections.
In his memorandum, Minister of Agriculture Manny Pinyol said that a temporary ban on the import of domestic and wild pigs and their products, including pork, pork skin and semen from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, aims to “prevent the spread of ASF virus and protect the health of the local pig population ".
North Korea, along with Laos, has become the last country from which, due to an outbreak of ASF, the import of pork products has been temporarily banned.
In the memorandum, Minister Pignol ordered the adoption of the following emergency measures to prevent the importation of pigs and their products from pork from North Korea:
- The ban on the import of domestic and wild pigs and their products, including pork, pork skin and semen.
- Immediate suspension of processing, evaluation of applications and issuance of sanitary and phytosanitary import permits covering the above-mentioned products.
- Identification and confiscation of all deliveries of the above goods to the country by all veterinary quarantine inspectors and inspectors of the Ministry of Agriculture in all major ports.
