China Announces New Slaughterhouse Regulations in Effort to Slow Spread of African Swine Fever
As African Swine Fever (ASF) continues to spread in the Chinese hog herd, new regulations on the handling of infected swine at slaughter facilities will be enacted starting on Feb 1. Every hog to be slaughtered will need to have a blood test for ASF and only certified, clean animals will be allowed to be sold at market. Any infected hogs will now culled immediately and the slaughterhouse must suspend operations for 48 hours. Just today, an outbreak of ASF was confirmed on a hog farm with 73,000 head, the largest hog operation to report the presence of the virus in China thus far. In total, there have been 90 confirmed incidents of the virus in farms across China and over 200,000 hogs have been culled.
Ukrainian Grain Exports Rise In The First Half Of 2018/19 Following Record Crop
Total grain exports from Ukraine rose to 23.1 MMT for the first half of the 2018/19 crop marketing year, up from 20.7 MMT from the previous year.
This fall, Ukrainian officials claimed that a record crop had been brought in, totalling 70.1 MMT for all grains, compared to 61.3 MMT for the prior year. This record crop comes in spite of some drought concerns earlier in the 2018 growing season. Ukrainian corn exports grew the most, rising by 3.5 to 9.1 MMT in 2018/19 so far. The Ukrainian agriculture ministry expects total grain exports to rise to 47.2 MMT by the close of the marketing year in 2019, an increase of 7.8 MMT from last year.
Snow Accumulation And Sub-Zero Temps Forecast for Southern Plains
In the panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas, the National Weather Service is warning of winter weather conditions now through the end of the week. The NWS is forecasting around an inch of snow, with some areas possibly receiving nearly 2 inches while temps are expected to fall as low as -10 degrees F with the wind chill. Further to the northwest, N Illinois and N Indiana are under winter weather advisories, where freezing rain is forecast which may make roads slippery and travel hazardous.
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