Smuggled Chinese Meats Continue To Be Dumped In U.S.

The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service’s job of keeping African swine fever (ASF) out of the United States has been hampered by meat smuggling, Food Safety News (FSN) reported.

Photo Insert: The increased smuggling puts America’s animal agriculture at risk.

Whether commingled in those shipping containers stacked up at US ports or moved across a southern border run by cartels, there are more opportunities for meat smuggling into the US than ever before.

US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) keeps turning up evidence about how it is working. At the Los Angeles/Long Beach (LA/LB) Seaport from April 6 through June 6, 2021, CBP intercepted 19,555 pounds of prohibited pork, chicken, beef, and duck arriving from China.

At a big port like LA/LB, the “unmanifested animal products” were commingled in boxes of headphones, door locks, kitchenware, LCD tables, trash bags, swim fins, cell phone covers, plastic cases, and household goods. All those items are typical covers for the attempts to smuggle illegal meats.

Or the smugglers can just drive the illegal and dangerous meat across the Texas-Mexico border. In August 2021, CBP found 31 rolls of pork bologna (350 pounds) and two rolls of turkey ham concealed under blankets and seats of a smuggler’s car’s center console, and also inside a duffel bag.

According to APHIS, China is affected by ASF, classic swine fever, Newcastle disease, foot-and-mount disease (FMD), highly pathogenic avian influenza and swine vesicular disease. The increased smuggling puts America’s animal agriculture at risk. ASF alone holds the potential of wiping out the entire pork industry.

Pork products from ASF-hit nations could easily introduce the virus to the US, crippling the pork industry and U.S. pork exports valued at $6.5 billion annually. AFS spreads by contact with an infected animal’s body fluids.

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