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(CNN) –
Chinese authorities have announced further stringent measures to try to end the growing crisis of African swine fever in the country, which has spread to 18 provinces and resulted in the slaughter of over 200 000 pigs.
A few days after recognizing that the situation was "serious", the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture on Friday announced the first outbreak of the disease in Sichuan Province, in the south-west of the country, on a farm of 40 pigs.
The news is particularly worrying for officials because Sichuan is the largest pork producing region in China – a country that produces half of the world's pigs, with a population of about 500 million pigs.
Although the disease poses no direct threat to human health, its arrival and spread in China is increasingly threatening the pork industry, with a major potential impact on supplies and prices in the coming months.
In a rare document issued jointly Wednesday by the Ministries of Agriculture, Transport and Public Security, the government blamed unhygienic vehicles carrying pigs and "elements without legal animals out of high-risk areas for the rapid spread of the disease since the first case emerged in August.
The directive called for stricter national inspections of all livestock vehicles and tougher penalties for illegal transport and slaughter of pigs.
The document comes after the United Nations recently warned that the disease was "alive" in China and that it could quickly turn into an epidemic, the most virulent strain of swine fever resulting in a death rate of 100 % for infected pigs.
"What we see so far is only the tip of the iceberg," said Juan Lubroth, head of veterinary services at the United Nations, in September. Food and agriculture.
"The cross-border emergence of the virus, probably through product movements containing infected pork, will almost certainly occur," he added. "So, it's no longer" if "that will happen but when and what we can do together to prevent and minimize the damage."
African swine fever, which has neither vaccine nor treatment, was first detected in Asia last year in a region of Siberia, according to the UN.
In October, the Chinese authorities banned feeding pigs with kitchen waste or swill after linking the widely used practice to most early cases of the disease. They also announced their intention to set up a registration system for vehicles carrying livestock.
Despite UN recognition of China's efforts to contain the disease, some experts remain skeptical about Beijing's ability to control the disease, highlighting the challenges of increasing biosecurity in the large number of hog farms from the country.
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