Shillong, Sep 17: Pig farmers in the Krang area of East Khasi Hills are facing mounting financial losses as an outbreak of African Swine Fever (ASF) rips through the community.
A ground report has seen first-hand that a large number of pigs have died in Krang and pig farms in neighbouring villages are also devoid of livestock.
From being a source of extra income, pig farming is now the cause of much stress as farmers worry about how to pay off loans taken when they started to raise the animals, as they were encouraged to do under the state government’s Piggery Mission.
The virus causes a haemorrhagic fever with high mortality rates in domestic pigs and this is borne out by the farmers, who reported that their infected pigs bleed from their noses and experience discharge from their mouths. Though deadly to pigs, ASF does not affect humans.
Alfonbirth Kharsyntiew, general secretary of the Hill Farmers Union (HFU), said that they are still confused and do not know what to do as the concerned authorities have not come to inspect the affected areas or collect samples.
Kharsyntiew said that the HFU wants the government to waive the loans of these farmers taken under the Piggery Mission and provide them with compensation
The HFU also wants quarantine centres and checkpoints to be established and other preventive measures to be initiated to control the spread of the disease.
