Geronimo Raducu Branescu, Chairman of the National Sanitary Veterinary and Food Safety Authority (ANSVSA), presents the national situation of the swine fever, in Bucharest, capital of Romania, on Aug. 1, 2018. The African swine fever has had an aggressive, explosive development recently in Romania, with the number of outbreaks reaching 524, Branescu said Wednesday. (Xinhua/Agerpres)

BUCHAREST, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- The African swine fever has had an aggressive, explosive development recently in Romania, with the number of outbreaks reaching 524, a senior official with the National Sanitary Veterinary and Food Safety Authority (ANSVSA) said Wednesday.

According to Geronimo Raducu Branescu, Chairman of ANSVSA, out of the 524 outbreaks of the swine fever in Romania, 521 occurred in individual households and three in farms.

The government has stepped up measures to monitor, control and fight against the disease in order to prevent the spread of the virus and contain the losses generated by the outbreaks, officials said.

At the same time, regulations were adopted regulating the compensation of losses incurred on pig farmers as a result of the culling of animals following the outbreaks.

According to ANSVSA, pig farmers affected by the African swine fever have lost so far over 130,000 Romanian lei (32,000 U.S. dollars), for a price per kilogram of between 8 and 12 lei.

As early as mid-July, Romanian Minister of Agriculture Petre Daea requested in Brussels financial aid for the Romanian farmers affected by the African swine flu and the radical measures of intervention needed to be taken.

The number of African swine fever outbreaks in Romania soared in June this year, after the first suspicions of fever were confirmed in localities on Danube's Chilia Branch, eastern Romania. (1 U.S. dollar=3.96 Romanian lei)