National Pork Board Chief Veterinarian Dr. Dustin Oedekoven is working to build producer participation in AgView, a foreign animal disease contact-tracing platform that?s funded by the Pork Checkoff. He said his team has seen a large increase in usage throughout the past three months due in part to partnerships with producer databases.
?Permission from the producer can automatically be uploaded into AgView,? Dr. Oedekoven said. ?We’ve also created some of those interfaces with government databases so that, in the event of a foreign animal disease, that information, again with producer permission, can be pushed up to those databases, allowing for continuity of business, which is really important to the pork industry.?
AgView promotes business continuity for America?s pig farmers by uniquely making disease traceback and pig movement data available to the USDA and state animal health officials on day one of a foreign animal disease (FAD) outbreak.
National Pork Board member and Iowa pork producer Al Wulfekuhle said when it comes to disease monitoring and prevention, the industry asks a lot of state animal health officials. Tools like AgView should make their jobs a bit easier.
?We give this very difficult task to their state animal health officials,? Wulfekuhle said. ?We’re expecting them to find the disease – when I say the disease, it?s African swine fever – we’re expecting them to find it quickly and then to trace where it came from and where it went, quarantine the sites, and humanely euthanize animals, and, you know, save our industry.?
Dr. Oedekoven also said the U.S. Swine Health Improvement Plan (U.S. SHIP) is an exciting program in the pilot phase right now.
?It’s modeled after the very successful National Poultry Improvement Plan, and what it allows is for producers to voluntarily enroll in a program where they meet certification in three different areas- that’s biosecurity, surveillance and traceability,? Dr. Oedekoven said.
For more information on foreign animal disease prevention, or create an AgView account, visit porkcheckoff.org/agview.
