WATCH: Quarantine, task teams as govt tackles foot and mouth disease

Foot and mouth disease affects cloven-hooved cattle, is highly contagious and also affects sheep, goats deer, and other cloven-hooved animals and has the potential to spread rapidly. 

Neighbouring countries such as Botswana and Zimbabwe have already banned livestock imports from South Africa. 

Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Senzeni Zokwana met with the red meat industry in Pretoria on Monday to discuss steps to curb the spread of the disease.  

"One of the things we discussed was to look at what could be done by both the government and the industry and a number of proposals were brought up and hence the formation of the task teams. These task teams will focus on different areas of concern. In the area of trade we will need people who will be able to comfort other countries we are doing business with it is okay to continue trading in livestock as some of the meat comes from areas without the disease," said Zokwana. 

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The different task teams will include experts who will determine the amount of animals that have been affected. 

"We want to emphasise that this spillage is limited to the Vhembe district at Sundanie village and the affected cattle is less than 50 cattle in an area with about 10 000 to 15 000 cattle and the area will remain under quarantine and the vaccination process has begun so that no further infections can occur," added Zokwana. 

He assured consumers that the outbreak will not impact on the price of red meat. 

The CEO of the Red Meat Producers Organisation, Gerhard Schutte, said the price of red meat will instead decrease. 

"Its all about supply and demand and we are in a free market. We export about 3% of local production that will not go out anymore and so that is back into the local market. We know the buying power is not good at this stage so very good news for the consumer, red meat prices can go down a little bit."

The department’s Director of Animal Health, Mpho Maja, said the spillage will not have a health impact of people. 

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