ASF “is now everyone’s problem,” said Jaspinder Komal, Canada’s CVO.

At its recent general assembly meeting in Paris, OIE delegates agreed to launch a global initiative to control the spread of ASF and reduce its devastating economic impacts.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization will co-ordinate the international campaign with the OIE.

“We now have a global campaign to assist both infected and uninfected countries,” Komal said. “It also recognizes this is an economic and a social issue because of the mental health impact on producers.”

The OIE-FAO action will be the subject of further animal health meetings in Panama in September. This will build on the impetus generated by an international symposium against ASF hosted in Ottawa in May, Komal said.

The symposium led to a Canada-U.S. agreement to impose zoning restrictions on the movement of pigs without shutting down hog shipments between the two countries. If a case of ASF is identified, geographic boundaries are defined to contain the outbreak in accordance with OIE guidelines. The areas outside of these control zones are considered disease-free zones.

Under the Canada-U.S. zoning agreement, “Canada and the United States have worked to modify their export certificates to allow trade of live swine, swine semen, pet food and animal byproducts and meat to continue trade in approved disease-free zones in the event of an ASF outbreak,” Komal said.

A similar framework is being adopted in Europe where the disease has already popped up in several countries. Japan has also indicated its support for the zoning protocol developed by Canada and the U.S.

The OIE said the global control initiative is needed in part because there is no vaccine against the disease. ASF is spread by contact with infected hogs or contaminated feed, but it poses no threat to humans.

The OIE said it intends “to develop, improve and harmonize partnerships and co-ordination at national, regional and international levels — to control the disease, strengthen countries’ prevention and preparation efforts, and minimize the adverse effects on animal health, animal welfare and international trade.”

Among the steps needed to control ASF are effective traceability, management of wild pig populations and proper slaughter and disposal practices, the OIE said.

“Because of its complex epidemiology, it isn’t possible to control ASF without a co-ordinated response from the different sectors involved,” the OIE said. Governments need to ensure clear communication with all parties involved in the hog sector including those tracking wild herds.

Komal said federal officials are working with provincial governments and farm groups on how to raise awareness of the disease. This includes the threat ASF poses for small herds raised without the biosecurity protection large farms have in place.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is engaging with wildlife officials to deal with the threat posed by wild pigs and boars across the country.

The concern is that if ASF is discovered in wild boars or a small pig herd, it could shut down shipments from large farms in the surrounding areas.

“This is a complex problem,” said Komal.

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Climate change and global trade patterns are helping spread new viruses from Africa to Europe and other countries, Brian Evans, vice-president of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and chief veterinary officer, said May 27 in a telephone news conference.

“Canada has to continue to work on animal health security,” he said during a break from the annual meeting of World Animal Health Organization (OIE) in Paris. “We have to keep diseases out of this country and help eradicate them elsewhere.”

The global eradication of rinderpest was announced during the OIE meeting. The disease affects cattle, sheep and goats and has caused catastrophic economic dislocation around the world since 300 B.C., Evans said.

While rinderpest never afflicted Canada, the past decade has seen outbreaks of BSE in cattle, a fatal wasting disease in pigs and avian influenza in British Columbia costing farmers and governments billions of dollars in losses, he said.

Canada must continue contributing expertise as well as funds to the global fight against livestock diseases to help stop them from spreading.

Foot-and-mouth disease, which last surfaced in Canada in 1952, has devastated pig herds in South Korea, Japan and South Asia in recent months, he noted.

Those outbreaks have OIE discussing a campaign to eradicate the disease, which he equated to the successful international campaign to eliminate smallpox in humans. The eradication of rinderpest “is a major milestone in animal disease control.” It also shows that an historic disease can be overcome. “It will have beneficial impact on food security.”

Eliminating foot-and-mouth will require an expanded effort to distribute vaccines to farmers to protect their animals and fast action to contain an outbreak to prevent the spread of the disease, he said.

“Canada can play a major role in fighting it.” In the past, the Canadian International Development Agency has helped fund the development of key vaccines. The new disease laboratory in Winnipeg can also play a major role in finding ways to rid the world of the disease.

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Animal-care standards are being used to differentiate between products and are creating favourable trading opportunities for countries with the best ones, Dr. Ed Pajor told the recent Animal Welfare Forum at the University of Alberta.

“The idea is this: If you as a consumer are willing to pay more money for a product produced in this situation versus another situation, you no longer consider them to be like products,” Pajor said. “You believe there is something different about the product, and like product no longer applies to that situation.”

The World Bank has begun researching trade opportunities and how they relate to animal welfare, said Pajor, a member of the faculty of veterinary medicine who is recognized internationally for both his research in swine, dairy and poultry welfare and his expertise in animal-welfare standards and legislation.

“The World Bank says that if you want to get funds to improve animal agriculture within your country, you’ll need to show us your animalwelfare policies,” he said. “Animal welfare, according to the World Bank, is good business and ensures future access to markets.”

On the flip side, organizations in the United Kingdom are pushing the use of animalwelfare standards as a trade barrier, he noted.

The Canadian livestock industry, educators and veterinarians all need to be more involved in helping set standards that can be recognized around the world, Pajor said.

“We tend to focus more on regulations or standards set by governments or quasi-governmental organizations, but we really need to make sure we understand that there are a lot of other standards that are already in place. Industries that agricultural industries serve are already using standards for a great deal of the work they’re doing.”

Animal welfare is centred on values, which makes it difficult to talk about, he said.

“The question is always about what’s right or wrong in terms of the treatment of the animal, which is an ethical question,” he said. “That’s a question that is beyond the realm of science.” But there are numerous shared similarities, regardless of culture, he said.

“Animal welfare is not local, it’s not an activist group, it is a global issue,” he said.

FIVE FREEDOMS

Most cultures want to prevent injury and disease and minimize pain, stress and other negative states, he said.

“It’s essentially just a recapping of the five freedoms in different languages,” Pajor said. “The five freedoms are the core of what many organizations,

countries, and companies are using to develop animal-welfare policy and animal- welfare guidelines.”

The five freedoms are freedom from thirst, hunger and malnutrition; freedom from discomfort ; freedom from pain, injury and disease; freedom to express normal behaviour; and freedom from fear and distress.

Good animal-welfare practices create win-win situations for animals, people, industry, and consumers, said Pajor. Since values about how animals are treated are shared, this lends itself to the development

of global standards, he said.

Many standards, such as those followed by the European Union, have had a major impact on how animals are being raised and once conventions are adopted, they become minimum standards, he said.

“If you don’t follow the same standard, the idea is that you do not get the same kind of access to the marketplace.”

Leadership in global standards has come from a 175-country organization known as the World Organization for Animal Health, also known as the OIE.

“When standards are cast by the OIE, all members are expected to follow those standards,” said Pajor.

Most of their initiatives are directed by veterinarian delegates, and their standards are recognized by the World Trade Organization, so they indirectly affect world trade, said Pajor.

The OIE also sets standards for animal welfare that can be used in international trade or in countries that do not have animal-welfare legislation.

———

“Ifyoudon’tfollowthesamestandard, theideaisthatyoudonotgetthesame kindofaccesstothemarketplace.”

– Dr. Ed Pajor

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OIE director general Bernard Vallat said both countries had applied appropriate measures to control the outbreaks and OIE did not see the need for a specific international response.

“The OIE considers that this situation for the moment does not need a specific regional or global alert,” Vallat told Reuters May 26, following a news conference at OIE’s annual assembly.

“The countries are respecting all international standards and this is really a good reaction.”

Another disease being monitored by OIE is glanders – which is highly contagious among horses and also transmissible to humans – in view of recent cases in the Gulf region.

After Bahrain provided information about an outbreak, OIE was awaiting details from neighbouring countries before commenting on the severity of the situation, Vallat said.

Glanders, which can be fatal to equids and usually prompts culls of infected animals, is present in several countries and thought to be endemic in certain areas, according to OIE.

The organization is also pursuing work to improve co-ordinated action on risks affecting both animals and humans.

With an estimated 20 per cent of total animal production lost due to disease, there was a clear role for OIE in supporting efforts to feed a growing world population, Vallat said.

Food You Can Pronounce

Maple Leaf has launched a line of deli meats containing pronounceable ingredients, the company says in a release. The preservative-free Natural Selections product line features turkey, chicken, ham meats that contain no more than nine easy-to-recognize ingredients such as vinegar, lemon and sea salt. According to a recent national survey, the majority of Canadians (65 per cent) always read food labels but only 38 per cent recognize all the ingredients in the food they buy.

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In spring of 2009, China banned pork imports from H1N1-affected countries. That ban was lifted in December after Prime Minister Stephen Harper visited China.

Canada has since been working to develop supplementary certification requirements. Discussions on the Chinese importation of Canadian live swine are continuing and Canada is hopeful for early resolution.

While in Paris Ritz also met with the OIE director general Bernard Vallat and reaffirmed the Government of Canada’s commitment to the OIE by investing an additional $2 million over the next four years.

“Maximizing trade opportunities is a priority of Canada’s Economic Action Plan and supporting the vital international work of the OIE is part of our continued efforts to make sure our producers can compete on a level playing field,” said Minister Ritz. “This increased investment will support the important role the OIE plays in determining international science-based guidelines that govern the safe movement of animals and animal products.”

A key priority for this investment will be to provide Canadian expertise to support the OIE’s headquarters and regional capacity building activities. The OIE has played a central role in developing international consensus that recognizes Canada’s effective measures to deal with BSE, H1N1, and avian influenza.

“The positive impact of animal health policies not only on fair trade but also on poverty reduction and public health is in itself ample justification for financing and maintaining animal health strategies worldwide,” Dr. Vallat said. “Canada has always been supportive of OIE’s actions but I would like to stress my personal thanks to the Government of Canada for confirming it through this additional investment,” he added.

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According to the website of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), CFIA confirmed the disease Oct. 10 in a beef cow from an 89-cow herd in the Assiniboia region. The cow was slaughtered Oct. 22 but the source of the reportable disease in this case remains unknown, the OIE said.

The remaining herd will be retested after Nov. 15, 35 days after the first day of nighttime temperatures below 0C, the OIE said, to allow for incubation time and die-off of vectors due to cold weather.

The farm on which the animal was found is in the same area of Saskatchewan that was affected by an anaplasmosis outbreak in 1983, OIE said. Anaplasmosis, or “tick fever,” most severely affects adult cattle with such symptoms as fever, anemia, weakness, respiratory distress and, in some cases, death. Infected dairy cattle show “rapid” declines in milk output.

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