CONFISCATED. An employee of the General Santos City Veterinary Office prepares to burn at least 413 kilos of pork and other meat products they seized Wednesday morning (July 29, 2020) at a quarantine checkpoint along the national highway in Barangay Tinagacan. The meat products were reportedly purchased by a local distributor from a supplier in Davao Region. (PNA photo by Richelyn Gubalani)
GENERAL SANTOS CITY – Veterinary personnel here confiscated on Wednesday over 400 kilos of processed pork and other meat products from Davao Region that were reportedly purchased by a local distributor.
Dr. Rex Calub, meat inspection division chief of the City Veterinary Office, said the meat products were intercepted aboard a delivery van that was about to enter the city proper around 8 a.m.
He said personnel manning the quarantine checkpoint along the national highway in Barangay Tinagacan found the van carrying 591 packs of pork, chicken and beef siomai, and a box of broth pork cubes.
“We actually had prior information that a meat shipment from Davao City will be coming in so we intensified our checkpoint monitoring,” he said in an interview.
Calub said the seized products were reportedly consigned to a food cart franchisee in the area that also distributes processed meat.
He said they immediately burned the products, which was worth around PHP103,000, as a precautionary measure in case they were sourced from areas with confirmed cases of the African swine fever (ASF) disease.
The official said the city remains under high alert against the possible entry of ASF-contaminated pork products, especially from Davao Region.
Early this year, the Department of Agriculture confirmed ASF outbreaks in pars of Davao City, Davao del Sur, and Davao Occidental.
Since November last year, Calub said they already confiscated and destroyed over PHP1 million worth pork and other meat products from Luzon and other ASF-hit areas. (PNA)
