Windhoek
A whopping N$180 million was spent on the fight against two outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) that occurred in some parts of the northern communal areas (NCAs) in May and July of 2015.
This was announced on Friday when Minister of Agriculture, Water and Forestry John Mutorwa announced the successful containment of the two outbreaks.
“We won the 2015 FMD battle, but we must remain in a state of readiness and alertness for any potential future outbreaks,” the minister said.
“The war against the eventual eradication of trans-boundary animal diseases, including FMD, from any part of Namibia’s NCAs continues until final victory. Our colleagues in the Directorate of Veterinary Services are our soldiers. We must support them at all times,” he emphasised.
Stressing that all possible restrictive measures will now be implemented to avoid such outbreaks again, Mutorwa said due to tremendous support from government, livestock farmers, farmers’ unions, the Meat Board of Namibia, Meatco, traditional authorities and other stakeholders, this tremendous feat was achieved in a relatively short time.
The NCA’s will now – in accordance with the Interational Organisation for Animal Health’s (OIE) guidelines – be declared FMFD-free, six months after the last confirmed case was reported on July 22 2015 in the Omusati Region.
The containment of these outbreaks involved zoning movement control; decontamination; mass vaccination; disease surveillance and awareness creation.
The largest portion of the N$180 million was spent on procuring 3.7 million doses of FMD vaccine. The vaccine was used for three rounds of vaccination, covering an estimated 1.1 million cattle.
A total of 826 casual workers were recruited to augment veterinary staff for the various FMD outbreak control activities.
“Given the magnitude of this outbreak, both in terms of financial and human resources, the number of animals involved, uncontrolled cross-border movement of animals and the vast geographical size of the area, the focus henceforth will be on preventative measures, to ensure that such outbreaks don’t repeat. As such, the ministry requests the full cooperation of the Namibian public to continue complying with disease prevention measures, that are implemented by veterinary services throughout Namibia,” Mutorwa noted.
He said farmers in the NCAs are requested to present all the animals for FMD and CBPP (lung sickness) vaccinations and ear-tagging, when so announced and directed by the DVS, and utilise only official border posts to move animals across, particularly the Namibia/Angola border and also anywhere else, where the legal requirements so demand.
They should also report the presence of cattle not bearing official ear-tags to the nearest state veterinary offices and identify by means of official ear-tags animals to be moved and only to be moved on and with authorised veterinary movement permits.
Farmers are also requested to report all sick animals to the nearest veterinary office in their area at all times, as well as report all cases of illegal animal movements to the nearest veterinary office or police.