Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has deemed these pigs, developed by U.K.-based Genus PLC and PIC (Pig Improvement Company), safe for use in food and feed.

Environment and Climate Change Canada and Health Canada also ruled that environmental and human health risks were no different than with pigs currently available. The CFIA and Health Canada also found no difference in nutritional value, according to a Jan. 23 news release.

Matt Culbertson, PIC’s Chief Operating Officer, called it a milestone.

“We have spent years conducting extensive research, validating our findings and working with the Canadian government to gain approval,” he said in a Jan. 23 news release.

The Canadian pork sector attributes $130 million in annual losses to PRRS, which can cause fever, breathing problems, stillborn piglets and death.

No special label required

Genus PLC doesn’t intend to sell the PRRS resistant pigs until further regulatory authorization in other key markets, the federal government said.

“We are committed to the responsible and intentional introduction of the PRRS-resistant pig around the globe. Gaining approval in Canada is an important step in this process, and we are working with additional countries to gain regulatory approval and protect global trade prior to initiating sales and delivery,” said Culbertson.

The pigs have been permitted for food use in the U.S., Brazil, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic.

The gene edited pigs won’t require special labelling because Health Canada found no health and safety concerns.

“There is a transparency crisis in our food system,” said CBAN co-ordinator Lucy Sharratt. “If the government is going to allow companies to produce genetically engineered animals and plants, these foods have to be labelled for consumers.”

Organic groups and companies have also raised concerns over the lack of mandatory labelling for foods from gene-edited plants and animals.

Health Canada has been working with the Canadian General Standards Board since November on a public review of the National Standard for Labelling and Advertising of Foods.

According to a 2025 study from PIC, consumers will accept gene edited meat so long as they are educated on the reasoning and how it works.

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“Without enforceable standards and transparent labelling, consumers cannot be certain the pork they purchase hasn’t been altered through genetic engineering,” said duBreton president Vincent Breton in an Aug. 27 news release.

This summer, the federal government completed public consultation around regulation of pigs that are resistant to Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS) due to gene editing.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared the pigs for use in the American food supply earlier this year, saying the edits are safe for pigs and for humans who consume pork.

However, according to a duBreton survey, 74 per cent of consumers are “concerned about gene-edited pork in their food supply and demand total transparency,” the news release said.

Clear standards

DuBreton sells three lines of pork, according to its website: organic, humanely raised, and raised without antibiotics. It also holds certifications like Certified Humane Raised and Handled, and Global Animal Partnership.

The Canadian organic standards don’t allow gene-edited crops, livestock or material to be used in production. However, duBreton has been seeking clarity from other certification bodies and calling for them to take a clear stance against gene-edited pigs.

“Not being clear to the consumer and not giving him a chance to make a choice is wrong,” Breton said in an interview.

“We’ve not necessarily went to requesting a ban (on the use of gene editing), but at least, I mean, consumers should be aware.”

Breton said government-mandated labelling would be preferred, but at very least they’re looking to other certification bodies to take a stance against gene-edited animals.

Organic sector concerns

The Canadian organic sector has previously decried the lack of mandated transparency and traceability for gene-edited crops.

Health Canada deemed gene-edited crops safe for the food supply in 2022, and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency released its guidance the next year. Federal guidance put most gene-edited crops on the same plane as conventionally bred varieties.

No special labelling is required, though the government pledged a transparency steering committee and database.

A significant portion of the organic sector’s concern revolved around contamination of organic food supplies — for instance, due to cross-pollination or inadvertent purchasing of gene-edited seed varieties.

It argued that if it couldn’t guarantee food was free from gene-edited materials, it would lose credibility with consumers and trading partners.

Less risk of contamination

In the case of gene-edited livestock, the risk of cross-contamination is lower with livestock than with crops said Karen Murchison, executive director of Canadian Organic Growers.

Animals are less mobile than seed crops and are easier to track, Murchison said. However, the Canadian Organic Growers would still like to see mandatory labelling within the supply chain.

“We cannot see that livestock move into our production system,” she said. “Again, it’s really about that transparency and labelling.”

Breton said that since duBreton is largely vertically integrated, inadvertent use of edited genetics isn’t much of a risk for them. They can request guarantees from their genetic suppliers.

However, he said if certification bodies don’t take a firm stance on gene editing in their protocols, meat sold under those labels could include gene-edited pork.

It could confuse consumers or dilute claims like ‘natural,’ he said.

“Here I have a natural product at a dollar a pound less, and I have this Certified Humane. What’s the real difference? … They can’t become specialists on everything they eat.”

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For small breeders, “refattening” or buying adult hogs from big producers and feeding them for an extra few months until they put on an extra 40-50kg is a way to gamble on pork prices rising.

Why it matters: China has been a key importer of Canadian pork.

But analysts say regulators are concerned the bets fuel big price swings and squander feed, in the latter case clashing with a national push to cut grain use in livestock, especially as the trade war with the U.S. underscores a long-standing goal to reduce dependence on food imports.

“It can lead to short-term shortages followed by a glut, driving big price swings and unsettling the market,” said Pan Chenjun, senior animal protein analyst at Rabobank.

“The government seems intent on stabilizing pork prices, which remain weak, while protecting small farmers from losses and curbing speculative behaviour,” Pan added.

Muyuan Foods 002714.SZ, China’s top pig breeder, told state-run Beijing News in late May that it had halted sales to refatteners, after rumours of a policy meeting targeting the practice boosted pig firm stocks.

A crackdown is already underway, according to a source directly familiar with the matter and two briefed by others involved, one of whom said Guangdong province in southern China is a particularly strict enforcer.

The National Development and Reform Commission and Muyuan did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.

China, the world’s biggest pork consumer, is grappling with weak demand and oversupply that have eroded margins.

Cash hog prices have hovered around 14 yuan per kg (C$2.67) since February, down from a peak of 21 yuan last August, according to MySteel data.

Refattening boosts pork supply when the pigs hit the market and worsens price drops when the market is already falling, said Lin Guofa, senior analyst at Bric Agriculture Group, a consultancy.

A 150-kg pig yields about 142 per cent of the pork produced by a 115-kg pig, Lin added.

Feed efficiency is also a concern as China looks to cut grain use in animal feed, especially with the trade war speeding its move away from the U.S. soybeans that mostly go into animal feed.

Pigs are most efficient at around 120 kg. Beyond that, they eat more but grow less, Pan said.

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Instead, many went to a local Indiana slaughterhouse for less than $200 each after the Chinese buyer canceled the order within a week of China implementing retaliatory tariffs against the U.S. in April.

China is one of the biggest importers of American breeding pigs and other livestock genetic material such as cattle semen. These lucrative niche export markets had been growing, but dried up since U.S. President Donald Trump started a trade war with Beijing.

U.S. farmers and exporters said the dispute has already cost them millions of dollars and jeopardized prized trade relationships that took years to develop.

Long-term brand damage

Though Washington and Beijing agreed to pause tariffs last week, exporters said Trump’s unpredictable trade policy has caused their companies long-term damage and could encourage China and other major buyers to turn to foreign rivals like Denmark.

“We’ve got brand damage now. There’s not a week that goes by without clients asking what’s happening with the U.S.,” said Tony Clayton, owner of Clayton Agri-Marketing, a Missouri-based livestock exporting company.

“I don’t know how we can put this back together. This is long-term damage,” he said.

White House spokesperson Kush Desai said the administration was “working around the clock to secure billions of dollars in even more opportunities with our other trading partners.”

Some farmers raise pigs specifically for breeding, a niche business within the $37 billion U.S. hog industry. Farmers pay top dollar for these specialty pigs, which have favorable genetics to produce lots of healthy piglets that can eventually be processed into tasty, high-quality pork.

Lemmon, an Indiana veterinarian and farm owner, has been selling pigs worldwide for over 30 years. He said he spent more than a year working on the $2.4 million sale of the pedigreed pigs to China. He noted they were carefully bred for good health, litter size and high fat content that leads to richly marbled, tender meat when cooked.

“It’s devastating when it happens,” Lemmon said, referencing the sale he lost.

He said he plans to stay in the breeding business, and is working to rekindle the deal with his Chinese buyer during the tariff pause.

Cattle, pig genetic shipments on pause

Roughly half of the world’s pigs live on Chinese farms. The country has purchased large quantities of breeding pigs from the U.S. since an outbreak of African swine fever, a virus with a near-total fatality rate, wiped out millions of the country’s hogs in 2018.

Shipping livestock is lucrative but time-consuming. Shippers must personally fly with the animals or hire an on-board attendant who can make the rounds to keep their pricey passengers well-hydrated and comfortable during a long flight. When not working, the attendants chat with the flight crew or sometimes lie in sleeping bags next to the animals in the chilly cargo bay, exporters and farmers said.

China has also been the biggest importer of semen from U.S. dairy cows, known for producing large amounts of protein-rich milk. But “Not one unit of semen is going to China right now,” Jay Weiker, president of the National Association of Animal Breeders, said, noting China had been importing one-quarter of all U.S. cattle semen, which they use to artificially inseminate their dairy cows.

The Chinese milk industry began importing large amounts of cattle semen to improve the genetics of domestic dairy cows after a deadly scandal over contaminated milk in 2008, Weiker said. At least six children in China died and nearly 300,000 fell ill after a Chinese manufacturer added melamine, a dangerous chemical, to milk powder to make the protein levels appear higher.

Brittany Scott, owner of SMART Reproduction Services, a sheep and goat genetics company, said several foreign customers had also pulled out of deals. This left many vials of semen sitting in her Arkansas facility, frozen in tanks of liquid nitrogen and waiting for buyers. “They are eager to do their jobs,” Scott said of her male goats and sheep. “They understand the assignment and they do really well.”

However, the work of selling their product has proven harder after Trump announced sweeping tariffs in April, and China retaliated.

The lost sales have been “a punch in the gut,” Scott said.

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