By Dominique Gabriel G. Bañaga
The Bago City government will begin implementing checkpoints next week, in accordance with the recently-issued guidelines against African swine fever (ASF) by the Negros Occidental provincial government.
Bago Mayor Nicholas Yulo said he has called a meeting with the City Veterinary Office and their local ASF Task Force.
Yulo directed them to set up checkpoints along Barangays Taloc and Tabunan, making sure that pork shipments from Bacolod City would not enter the locality.
He also ordered the personnel manning the checkpoints to strictly adhere to the anti-ASF protocols to prevent another surge of hog diseases in the province.
Earlier this week, Negros Occidental Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson signed Executive Order 24-07, establishing guidelines for “the entry of all live pigs, boar semen, pork, products, and other pork-related food items from areas with reported cases of ASF into the province.”
The EO bans the entry of hogs and pork products from Luzon, Mindanao, Eastern Visayas, Panay Island, Guimaras Island, Cebu province including Camotes and Bantayan Islands, Negros Oriental, and Bacolod.
The ban exempts fully-cooked processed pork products, such as ham, sausages, hotdogs, canned goods, pork chicharon, and pork-based seasonings, provided that they are sourced from meat establishments with a certificate of compliance from the ASF Public-Private Audit.
The entry of hogs and pork byproducts into ports, such as in Negros Occidental cities of San Carlos, Escalante and Cadiz, as well as the towns of E.B. Magalona and Pulupandan will be prohibited.
“All ports, under the supervision of the province, will strictly follow the no-entry zone for pork products coming from red zones,” Lacson said.
He further added that the provincial ASF task force assigned to Bredco and Banago ports in Bacolod will be removed.
The task force will ensure that pork products being delivered in Bacolod will remain in the city only.
Lacson said the reason for the new guidelines on pork-related products is the high pork prices in Bacolod.
“The intention is to bring down the price of pork here in Bacolod,” Lacson said.
Based on the monitoring by the Negros Occidental Provincial Veterinary Office as of February 20, the price of pork in Bacolod is at P410 per kilogram.
Meanwhile, pork being sold in the province is as low as P290 per kilogram.
Lacson said that since Bacolod was tagged as a “red zone,” the city can accept pork and pork byproducts from areas also tagged as “red zones.”/DGB, WDJ