China's major hog supplier clamps down on 'pig speculators'

China's Yunnan Province has taken a hard line against "hog speculators," whose illegal transportation has been blamed for fueling the spread of swine fever and disrupting the market.

The major hog supplier in southwest China has reported seizures of over 10,000 illegally transported pigs since it suspended hog transportation amid the swine fever epidemic in September.

Inspections on major highways and trans-provincial roads have been enhanced to crack down on illegal transportation by profiteers, according to the province's agricultural and public security authorities.

Hog speculators, who purchase cheaper pigs from Yunnan and sell them at higher prices in other provinces, have seized headlines by cramming pigs into passenger cars to dodge inspections and spreading rumors of swine fever outbreaks to manipulate purchase prices.

The Economic Daily reported that traffic police in Sichuan Province, which neighbors Yunnan, recently intercepted a van carrying 24 pigs from Yunnan. An official was cited as saying that some speculators even crammed the animals into modified SUVs to avoid seizures.

Officials and industry insiders said speculators could earn as much as 2,000 yuan (US$285) from one pig by capitalizing on the low hog prices in Yunnan.

The crackdown on speculations came as China moved to keep pork prices stable in a market hit hard by the African swine fever.

First reported in northeast China's Liaoning Province in 2018, the swine fever has forced China to cull 1.19 million pigs. Responding to the ensuing hikes in pork prices, the Chinese government has taken multi-pronged measures including releasing frozen pork reserves, expanding pork imports and increasing subsidies to restore hog production.

Several Chinese provinces suspended the trans-provincial transportation of hogs, blamed for over 60 percent of the disease outbreaks, while encouraging pork transportation as a replacement.

At a recent meeting on restoring hog production, Vice Premier Hu Chunhua stressed the need to encourage hog producers to expand production and to tighten supervision to prevent hoarding, profiteering and price rigging.

The latest statistics showed that pork prices had ceased their upward trend in recent weeks amid signs of hog production recovery nationwide.