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moscow / reuters / Russia s animal and plant health watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor said Nov. 7 it had registered three new outbreaks of African swine fever (ASF), in the Rostov, Voronezh and Kursk regions bordering Ukraine.

Unlike most previous cases, when ASF was discovered at small backyard farms, in Voronezh it was discovered at a farm where 700 hogs were held and in Rostov the affected farm had 9,000 pigs.

In Kursk, local authorities are trying to find the owner of a pig which died of ASF, and was left in a refuse dump, a Rosselkhoznadzor statement said.

Last week Rosselkhoznadzor said that in 2011 it registered 37 ASF outbreaks, of which 27 were at pig farms and 10 among wild boars.

Coulter bridge on government fast track

staff / Provincial officials have pledged to replace the buckled bridge near Coulter on PR 251 in half the time it usually takes, said a spokesman with Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation.

Unfortunately, it usually takes five years. Due to damage to this bridge, we must replace it and

we ve already started the engineering design for a new one. It normally takes about five years to design, receive environmental approval and build a bridge of this size. However, like we did for the Pierre Delorme Bridge in St. Adolphe, we are working to get this bridge done in half that time, a spokesperson said.

A temporary bridge was deemed unfeasible because of the steep embankments and the required length, estimated at 1.6 km long.

There are significant concerns that due to those factors, a temporary bridge could not withstand ice and high, fast-moving waters in the spring.