Defra tightens pork import rules to reduce ASF risk
Defra has tightened the rules around personal pork imports to strengthen safeguards against deadly African swine fever entering the UK, protecting the country’s £8bn pig industry.
From 27 September, personal imports of pork and pork products from the European Economic Area (EEA), the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Switzerland will be banned unless they meet EU commercial standards and weigh less than 2kg.
The government says the measures aim to prevent the introduction of African swine fever (ASF) into the UK through infected meat, which could have devastating effects on both the domestic pig farming sector and the £600m pork export market.
Previous measures introduced in September 2022 banned the import of pork and pork products not produced to EU commercial standards that weighed more than 2kg.
But these new rules go further, restricting the import of pork and pork products to only those produced to EU commercial standards, and limiting those imports to 2kg.
The National Pig Association (NPA) had wanted the government to introduce a total ban on personal pork imports to the UK, which has been introduced in countries including Australia, Japan, the EU, New Zealand and the US.
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