Overview of the perceived risk of transboundary pig diseases in South Africa

Mokoele, Japhta M.; van Rensburg, Leana Janse; van Lochem, Shanie; Bodenstein, Heinz; du Plessis, Jacolette; Carrington, Chris A.P.; Spencer, B. Tom; Fasina, Folorunso O.

The inclusion criteria for participants were as follows: (1) being a state veterinarian or a pig consultant, and (2) having had provision of pig-related veterinary services within the last 3 years. The exclusion criteria were: (1) being part of the study-group membership, (2) specialisation in other species or (3) having other interests that could potentially bias the study. The six veterinarians who were used to test the questionnaire instrument were similarly excluded from participating in the final questionnaire. All participants willingly consented to be part of the study. A total of 65 questionnaires were administered and 57 (87.69%) were returned; incomplete responses or multiple responses rendered another 12 to be unusable. A total of 45 responses (69.23%) were entered into an excel data sheet (Microsoft, USA) and a descriptive analysis and a rotated factor loading analysis (RFLA) were conducted on the data using the online WESSA statistical software (Wessa 2012) . Weighting values of ≥ 0.500 were taken as significantly positively or negatively correlated in the RFLA.