Belgian government buys pig farms - 366 farms participate
The Belgian government is buying pig farming businesses in order to reduce nitrogen emissions. More than 360 farms are participating.
In South Chungcheong province in South Korea, the first pig skyscraper of South Korea is set to be built according to a report by the Korea Times. The province is located in the west of the country, south of the capital Seoul, and has a population of over 2 million. In February, Kim Tae-heum, the governor of the province, signed a memorandum of understanding with the Chinese pig conglomerate Yangxiang Group. The goal of this cooperation is to establish a vertical pig farming operation in the region.
Partnering with a giant in the Chinese pork industry
According to its own statements, the Yangxiang Group was founded in 1998 and holds over 250,000 sows and 5,000 boars in several high-rise buildings in China. The conglomerate describes itself as a technology-oriented agricultural and animal husbandry company with a complete chain from breeding animals and semen to sows and fattening pigs, all the way to feed and barn equipment.
Following the Chinese model, South Korea is now planning a highly intensive and industrialized pig farming facility that would allow breeding and processing pigs on only 10% of the previous areas in a more efficient, biosecure, and sustainable way, according to the provincial government.
Criticism from animal rights activists
The Korean animal rights organization, Korea Animal Rights Advocates, strongly criticized the planned pig skyscraper. The organization warns that even the most modern systems do not eliminate the risk of infection when housing hundreds of thousands of animals in close quarters and significantly complicate disease control.
In response to the criticism, the animal breeding department of the South Chungcheong provincial government stated that it is only a memorandum of understanding and that the design of the pig facility could differ from that of China.