Data source and unit of analysis
This study spanned 10 years from 2009 to 2018. Data for the risk assessment were collected by country and by month. In case of Italy, regions excluding Sardinia was unit of analysis. ASF outbreaks in domestic pigs were based on immediate and follow-up notifications of OIE (OIE, 2019). Data on pig production including the number of pig farms and the pig population, the yields/carcass weight per pig, and the annual pork production were obtained from the OIE (2018b), FAOSTAT (2018), and National Institute of Statistics of Italy (Istat) (2019). The statistics associated with legally imported live pigs and pig products were obtained from the Animal Quarantine Statistics of Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency (APQA, 2019). All data were stored in Microsoft Excel 2016 for the subsequent analysis. A stochastic quantitative risk assessment was conducted with these collected data.