Denmark builds a pig wall
丹麦修建栅栏阻挡野猪
Can a border fence keep out wild boar?
边界围栏能否阻挡野猪的入侵？
Danes are building a controversial barrier along the border with Germany
丹麦人正在与德国的边境线修筑一道有争议的屏障。
MARTIN ELLERMAN, the mayor of Harrislee, a town on the German-Danish border, is fuming. At the behest of the Danish government, a five-foot steel fence is being built along the 70 km (40-mile) border to prevent an influx of immigrants from the rest of Europe. Mr Ellermann thinks it an aesthetic affront that violates the European ethos of invisible borders.
马丁·埃尔曼（MartinEllerman）是德国和丹麦边境的哈里斯里镇的镇长，他现在正大发雷霆。在丹麦政府的要求下，沿着70公里（40英里）的两国边界正修建一道5英尺高的铁制栅栏，以防止来自欧洲其他地区外来物种的涌入。埃尔曼认为，这是一种违背欧洲无形边界精神的审美冒犯。
The immigrants in question are wild boar, which can carry African Swine Fever (ASF). Although the disease has not yet been diagnosed in Germany, there have been outbreaks in eastern Europe and Belgium; and diseases travel fast among Europe’s vast numbers of boar. The virus poses no threat to humans but it spreads easily to domestic pigs, killing nearly all it infects. There is no cure and no vaccine, so the Danes have opted for a radical solution: shoot all the boar in Denmark and keep out foreign ones.
这里所说的外来物种是野猪，可能会携带非洲猪瘟（ASF）病毒。尽管这种疾病在德国尚未确诊，但在东欧和比利时已经爆发，在欧洲数量众多的野猪中传播迅速。尽管这种病毒对人类没有威胁，但很容易传播到家猪身上，几乎令所有受感染的猪死亡。因为没有治愈方法和疫苗，所以丹麦人选择了一种激进的解决办法：射杀丹麦国内的所有野猪，并将国外的野猪拒之门外。
Eradicating an entire species (albeit temporarily) seems an extreme approach to agricultural insurance, but Denmark has almost three times as many pigs as inhabitants. An outbreak of ASF would threaten more than 30,000 jobs and more than €4bn ($4.5bn) of annual exports of pig meat, which account for half of the country’s agricultural exports.
根除一个完整物种（尽管只是暂时的）似乎是确保农业保险的一种极端做法，但丹麦猪的数量几乎是居民的三倍。非洲猪瘟的爆发将威胁到30000多个就业岗位和达40多亿欧元（45亿美元）的猪肉年出口量。猪肉出口占丹麦农产品出口值的一半。
Jens Munk Ebbesen of the Danish Agriculture and Food Council, which is responsible for helping farmers bring home the bacon, says America, China and Japan will stop their imports of Danish pork if a single wild boar infected with ASF is detected in Denmark—as happened in the Czech Republic in 2017. Vincent ter Beek, editor of Pig Progress, is sympathetic to the Danish move. Although he says it is not a fail-safe, the porcine publication is pro-fence.
丹麦农业和食品委员会着力为农民谋取福利。该委员会的延斯·蒙克·艾博生（Jens Munk Ebbesen）表示，一旦发生类似2017年捷克的猪瘟疫情，在丹麦检测到感染非洲猪瘟的野猪病例，美国、中国和日本将会停止进口丹麦的猪肉。《养猪进展》的编辑文森特·特·比克（Vincent ter Beek）对丹麦的举措表示同情。虽然他说这不是一个万无一失的方案，但出版物《养猪进展》对修建围栏持赞同的立场。
But critics say the fence will do more harm than good. According to Bo Oksnebjerg, the boss of the World Wildlife Fund in Denmark, only proper observance of rules on, for instance, using disinfectant and disposing of carcasses will offer protection against an outbreak of the disease; the new barrier, which reaches half a metre underground to stop boars from digging their way under it, will disturb flora and wildlife and will not prevent boar from crossing rivers along the border, for they are good swimmers. A pig of a problem, indeed.
但批评人士表示，围栏弊大于利。丹麦世界野生动物基金会的会长Bo Oksnebjerg认为，只有正确遵守有关使用消毒剂和处理尸体等规定，才能防止疾病的爆发；深入地表半米并阻止野猪向地下挖路的新围栏屏障会对植物和野生动物带来危害，不能够阻止野猪从边境的河流穿越过去，因为它们是游泳高手。野猪确实是个大问题。
