Foot and Mouth: KZN must plan to deal with new disease outbreak

The Democratic Alliance (DA) has called on KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) MEC, Bongiwe Sithole-Moloi to urgently announce her Department’s plan to deal with the recent outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in the province.
The appeal comes after the disease was detected in cattle in the Mtubatuba area last week.
DA KZN spokesperson on Agriculture and Rural Development and member of the provincial legislature, Martin Meyer, said that the DA was “extremely concerned” regarding the Department’s readiness to deal with the latest outbreak.
“At this stage, there is no way that it can possibly do what is needed given the severe shortage of state veterinarians in the province. This is compounded by the freeze on all appointments which was announced during the recent provincial budget,” Meyer said.
“Foot-and-mouth disease poses a very serious threat to both commercial and subsistence farmers, many of who farm on communal land across KZN. The disease has very severe implications for farming, as it is highly infectious and can be spread comparatively easily through contact with contaminated farming equipment, vehicles, clothing and feed,” he said.
Meyer said that stopping the spread of the disease called for “a considerable operation of vaccination, monitoring, quarantine and even the culling of animals”.
“If not dealt with quickly and effectively by the department, the disease could seriously harm our farmers, as well as the export of meat products which bring important foreign capital into our country and province,” Meyer said. He said the DA called on the MEC to announce her plan to deal with this outbreak without any delay.
“In addition, we call on the chairperson of KZN’s Agriculture and Rural Development portfolio committee to convene an urgent meeting so that the department can present a full report and outline its plan to deal with the disease.”