Canadian hog farmers and Canada’s pork industry are world export champions, selling most of what they produce to foreign buyers.

That’s something to be proud about. Canadian farmers are selling top-quality product to picky foreign buyers who have the choice to buy pork from anywhere, but often find Canada’s to be the best combination of quality and price on the world market.

That export success is also an enormous risk.

With about 70 percent of Canadian pork exported, and about 90 percent of Manitoba’s production leaving the country, what would happen if all foreign markets were simultaneously closed?

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That nightmare scenario is far from inconceivable.

Underneath the bullishness about the future for Canadian pork exports expressed at the Manitoba Swine Seminar Feb. 7, anxiety murmured. World market demand is strong and growing, and Canada is well-positioned to supply that demand, but an outbreak of African swine fever in Canada could cause an industry wreck.

That disease is spreading across the gigantic Eurasian landmass, infecting pigs and wild boars from northeastern China to Belgium.

Not only does it lead to mass-culling of animals in infected areas, but it can lead to export bans and exile from the world market.

The danger is so severe for a major exporter that the Danes are building a border fence all the way along their border with Germany.

For countries like China, that’s not a huge deal. China has the world’s biggest pig herd, but it also eats the most pork in the world and exports little. ASF is a domestic supply problem for China, not an export access problem.

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For countries like the United States, being banned from some or many export markets would be bad news. The American industry has grown in recent years faster than its domestic consumption, with ever-greater proportions of its production needing to be exported. In 2018, 26 percent of U.S. production was exported.

We’ve already seen what happens when foreign markets for U.S. pork become blocked. Last year, U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war with Mexico disrupted markets, as hams piled up in the U.S. and Canadian prices took a hit.

But Canada is so much more vulnerable. Canada can’t consume anywhere near all the pork it produces. If 70 percent of Canadian production and 90 percent of Manitoba production needs to be exported, “it’s a good thing that we’ve got export because we’ve got an awful lot of production,” noted Canadian Pork Council chair Rick Bergmann at the Manitoba Swine Seminar.

“We’re extremely export dependant…. Without export, folks, we’re dead in the water.”

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Avoiding infection in the first place is obviously the best strategy. Since the disease can live among and be spread by wild pigs and wild boars, avoiding all contact with those is vital.

But ASF is actually considered to be a disease spread by humans, because many of the outbreaks have been traced to infected feed and leftovers from human food. The virus can live for months in a sandwich or sausage.

“It is highly recommended that all barns ban all pork products from their sites,” said Red Deer swine veterinarian Egan Brockhoff at the swine seminar.

If an ASF outbreak occurred in Canada and exports were stopped for any significant period, pigs would pile up on farms and then mass euthanasia would occur. There is nowhere to warehouse millions of hogs that have outgrown barn capacity.

And domestic prices would crash. Think of 1998 all over again.

How can a farmer protect himself against this risk? That’s a very tough question to answer. Physically, there’s no real way to prepare for a situation like that.

In terms of revenue and income protection, there are various insurance programs that might apply in certain circumstances in certain ways.

Checking out how those programs might affect your operation would be a smart thing to do before a disaster strikes.

What programs are you using? What are you not using?

How would your lender react if a disaster struck?

How are your cash reserves?

It’s worth considering the scenarios that could occur to your farm should ASF strike. It is a real and growing menace that has already hit many countries, and from which we import many things that could carry the disease to our shores.

The Danes have only a 70-kilometre frontier with Germany. They’re hoping to fence-out ASF.

Canada can’t fence out the world. Even if Canada tightens port and airport security, we have a 6,000 km border with the U.S., and that ain’t ever getting fenced.

So, the best protections are preparation and prayer.

Preparation can only be done beforehand, and the time for that is now.