Piglets are held in pens at a pig farm. [Photo/IC] China has lifted pig quarantines in most of the areas where outbreaks of African swine fever have been found, signaling a steady slowdown in the spread of the virus, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said on Tuesday. Since the first outbreak of the deadly pig disease was discovered in August in Northeast China's Liaoning province, 113 cases in 28 provincial-level regions have been confirmed by the ministry. Restrictions on the transport of pigs in 105 of those cases have been lifted. The ministry has imposed strict quarantine measures in affected areas and ramped up supervision of pig farms, transport businesses and the pork processing industry after the onset of the highly contagious viral disease. Humans are not affected. Yu Kangzhen, vice-minister of agriculture and rural affairs, said the spread of the virus has slowed because of measures imposed by the authorities, but added that it's difficult to wipe out the disease in the short term. In the latest case, which was discovered on March 12 in Linshui county of Guang'an, Sichuan province, a transport truck carrying 150 pigs, nine of them dead, was seized at a toll station. It was the second case in March after an outbreak that killed 20 pigs on a breeding farm in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region was confirmed on March 7. The next step, Yu said, is to maintain the momentum of the ongoing disease prevention and control measures and strengthen oversight over the slaughtering sector. On Friday, the ministry launched checks on slaughterhouses nationwide and ordered them to carry out self-inspections. Yu stressed the need to secure supplies of live pigs and pork products. The domestic output of live pigs in China has been declining since the second half of last year because of the disease, according to Yang Hanchun, a professor at the College of Veterinary Medicine of China Agricultural University. Yang predicted that the supply of pork products is likely to tighten in the third or fourth quarter of this year and lead to a price surge. custom-braceletsblack rubber bracelets meaningcustom-wristbandsdual-layer-wristbandrubber bracelets
Photo taken on June 2, 2018 shows the Gaofen-6 being launched on a Long March-2D rocket at 12:13 pm Beijing Time from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. [Photo/Xinhua] JIUQUAN - China on Saturday launched a new Earth observation satellite, Gaofen-6, which will be mainly used in agricultural resources research and disaster monitoring. The Gaofen-6 was launched on a Long March-2D rocket at 12:13 pm Beijing Time from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. A scientific experiment satellite named Luojia-1 was sent into space at the same time. It was the 276th mission of the Long March rocket series. Weighing 1,064 kg and with a designed life of eight years, Gaofen-6 has a similar function to that of Gaofen-1 satellite, but with better cameras and its high-resolution images can cover a large area of the Earth, according to the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence. Gaofen-6 can observe chlorophyll and other nutritional content of crops, and help to estimate yields of crops such as corn, rice, soybeans, cotton and peanuts, said Tong Xudong, chief engineer of the Gaofen series satellites. Its data will also be applied in monitoring agricultural disasters such as droughts and floods, evaluation of agricultural projects and surveying of forest and wetland resources, said Tong. Developed by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, it will form a constellation with other Gaofen satellites in orbit. Since the Gaofen project began in 2010, China has had an increasingly clearer view of the planet. Launched in April 2013, Gaofen-1 can cover the globe in just four days. Gaofen-2, sent into space in August 2014, is accurate to 0.8 meters in full color and can collect multispectral images of objects greater than 3.2 meters in length. Gaofen-4, launched in late 2015, is China's first geosynchronous orbit high-definition optical imaging satellite. Gaofen-3, launched in August 2016, is China's first synthetic aperture radar-imaging satellite. Gaofen-5, launched in May 2018, has the highest spectral resolution of China's remote sensing satellites. The project has helped reduce China's dependence on foreign remote sensing satellite data. debossed-wristbandblank-wristbandsilicone wristbandssilicone-wristbandscustomize-bracelets<%2fcenter>
