The Daily 1,100

Just like any other day, today’s passengers on a small tugboat chugging away on the Jurong river are the 1,100 pigs which have travelled overnight on a seven-hour journey from Pulau Bulan, a tiny Indonesian island one-sixth the size of Singapore. The island is dedicated to pig farming, and is the only farm approved by the Agro-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA) to export live pigs here.

The Buroh Lane Abattoir, Singapore’s only slaughterhouse, was set up on 27 April 1999 to compliment the adoption of the cold chain system where an integrated system of processes in the abattoir keeps meat chilled or frozen when it is sold. These measures were taken in response to the 1999 Nipah virus outbreak where diseased pigs imported from Malaysia infected a number of abattoir workers here. Currently, the abattoir accounts for about 20 per cent of Singapore’s pork supply. The slaughterhouse is owned by Primary Industries, a subsidiary of the Singapore Food Industries group and employs around 60 locals and Malaysians.