24 Apr 2013

The Assistant Minister of Agriculture, Mr Oreeditse Molebatsi says the Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) situation in Ngamiland is worrisome.

Answering a question in Parliament, Mr Molebatsi said as much as there had been no cases of the disease in zones 2a and 2b for the last two years, cases however continued to be in zones 2c and 2d.

He noted that the last cases in these zones were in February and March this year in Gumare (53 cases) and Kareng (15 cases) respectively.

Further, Mr Molebatsi explained that the control of FMD in the area was complicated by the frequent mixing of livestock and wildlife as a result of the poor state of disease control fences in the area.

“The fences are inaccessible to maintenance teams for the most part of the year due to the over-flooding of the Okavango delta. The situation is exacerbated by the inability of farmers to present all cattle for vaccination when required to do so by ministry officials,” he said.

Mr Molebatsi also noted that the ministry followed up these sporadic cases with ring vaccination followed by a booster after 28 days while this was in line with best veterinary practice for the control of the disease.

The vaccination, he noted was applied together with movement control, biosecurity measures and surveillance.

Meanwhile, Mr Molebatsi said the export of live cattle from Botswana to Zimbabwe through the Botswana Meat Commission (BMC) was on-going and currently cattle were being bought from the protection zone in Ngamiland and from the Mmadinare/Bobirwa.

He also said the arrangement could be rolled out to other zones within Ngamiland provided those zones were free from the disease for at least six months.

Further, the assistant minister noted that the recent outbreaks of FMD in Gumare and Kareng renders zone 2c and the rest of zone 2d to be non-compliant with the requirements for live cattle export to Zimbabwe while for now, any roll out could only be to zones 2a and b which have not had the disease for two years.

Ngami MP, Mr Taolo Habano had asked the minister to brief Parliament on the current state of FMD in Ngamiland in zones A2c, A2d and sub-zone 2b and A2a.

MP Taolo had also wanted to know whether the current arrangement between BMC and Zimbabwe of buying live cattle from zone A2d especially Haina Veld and main areas would be rolled out to other areas, if so, when. ENDS