Pigs

Swine fever / African swine fever

Pigs can get sick from swine fever or African swine fever. The African swine fever is transmitted by wild boar, among other things. Many infected pigs have already been found in the wild in Belgium and the rest of Europe. The chance that this swine fever reaches a corral seems only a matter of time.

Various forms of swine fever are active in many countries around the world. Millions of animals have already been culled in China, but the virus is also spreading in Eastern Europe and Russia. In many cases, the animals are not culled in an animal-friendly manner. Sometimes animals are buried alive. At other locations the electric cattle prod rod is used improperly. In all cases these are very undesirable methods. Because of poor preparation and the fact that professional culling teams are not on standby the animals find themselves in an animal-unfriendly situation. The implementers are not adequately trained, there is often no veterinary supervision and there is little structure in the overall approach to the swine fever crisis.

The TCC-group has developed various methods together with the Wageningen University WUR (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KBda80ebac) to cull pigs in an animal-friendly manner. These methods consist of electrocution and gassing (NOFF®). These methods are used in slaughterhouses and we can implement this on the farm at the pig farmer.

Our fully automatic NOFF (“knor” in Norwegian) is built into a sea container so that it can be transported quickly. It delivers a gas mixture fully automatically. 20 slaughter pigs can be euthanized in one go.

Universal

Large sows or bears, but also small pigs and piglets can be killed without modifications to the NOFF. This is a huge advantage over existing mobile systems. The existing systems are set for 1 type of pig in terms of size and weight. Deviations in size often lead to animal-unfriendly situations. The euthanization process is too short or insufficiently powerful, which causes animals to suffer unnecessarily.

The NOFF is universally applicable to all pig sizes. Whether it is a piglet or an adult bear, all pigs can be euthanized in the NOFF. A fully automatic treadmill neatly transports the killed animals to the container. Before the carcasses are deposited in the destruction container, the vet has the option to inspect or examine the animals. The capacity can be increased by applying multiple NOFFs at the same time.

All activities can be monitored from A to Z by the veterinarian. The NOFF is equipped with adequate lighting and inspection windows so that the behavior can be followed properly.

A swine fever crisis can be resolved quickly by deploying the mobile NOFF. The systems can be moved quickly through most transport systems that are available on trucks. Naturally, all hygiene protocols to prevent the spread of swine fever are taken into account.