Staff Reporter
THE president of the Namibia Agricultural Union (NAU), Piet Gouws, said that he is grateful that the Minister of Agriculture, Water and Land Reform, Calle Schlettwein, is making active efforts to prevent a Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreak in Namibia.
Gouws expressed his appreciation for the minister at the NAU Annual Congress, where he emphasised that Namibia will be “doomed” if the health status of livestock is compromised.
He said that preventing an FMD outbreak is therefore essential, especially because of the country’s dependence on meat exports to many lucrative continental and international markets, such as the United States of America (USA).
“We should remember: We are the only country in Africa that has this special export status, something that we should protect,” Gouws added.
He highlighted South Africa as a good example of the “economic chaos” that could ensue if an FMD outbreak were to occur. This point was further driven home by the Deputy President of Agri South Africa, Nicol Jansen, who explained that the FMD outbreak in five of the nine South African provinces had a devastating impact on the country.
“South Africa struggled to contain the spread of Foot-and-Mouth Disease that broke out beyond the redline area in Limpopo, near the Kruger National Park,” Jansen explained.
He said that South Africa therefore implemented a 21-day national restriction on the movement of cattle to delay the spread of the disease. He noted that a definite slowdown in the spread of the disease is visible in the country, but added that he hopes that more can be done to eradicate the disease.
“In these circumstances, we desire the traceability that is intact in Namibia, but we struggle with our own Department of Agriculture – in fact, with the government that wants to control everything, but implement nothing,” Jansen said.
