Japan has reported 1.17 million cases of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDv), the same virus that is causing great losses to the U.S. hog herd, across 805 farms, and pork production could fall by as much as 5% pushing up prices according to Kenji Morita of the country’s Agriculture Ministry. So far a record 343,070 piglets have died from the disease. Because of the outbreak, Japan is turning to imported meat. In the first five months of 2014 pork import to Japan gained 7.7% over a year earlier to reach 331,203 tons. Because the U.S., Canada, South Korea, and Taiwan have all been dealing with outbreaks of their own, more pigs from Mexico and the EU could be headed to Japan, the world’s biggest pork importing country.
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