150,000 cattle to be culled Farming

Taranaki farming leaders and politicians have broadly backed the Government’s plans to attempt to eradicate the cattle disease Mycoplasma bovis.

Cabinet made the decision yesterday to push ahead with ridding New Zealand of the disease, which is on a scale never faced before.

It's expected an additional 126,000 livestock will need to be culled on top of the 26,000 already earmarked for slaughter over the next one to two years, at a cost of around $886 million, was a ‘‘oncein-a-lifetime opportunity that pretty much no other country has had to eliminate M Bovis’’, Matthew Herbert, chairman of Taranaki Federated Farmers Sharemilkers’ Section, said. He said the move would give dairy farmers some certainty and compensation for their herds.

‘‘I think we would be silly not to at least give it a crack.’’

So far Taranaki has remained free of M Bovis, a bacterium which causes a range of cattle illnesses but does not affect humans.

Herbert said he did not think the cull would lead to the end of sharemilking, as some farmers have predicted. But he said it would ‘‘force us to really focus on improving our biosecurity measures on the farm and within herds’’.

Donald McIntyre, president of Federated Farmers Taranaki, also welcomed Monday’s announcement, calling it ‘‘really

great news’’. ‘‘That’s what everyone wanted so I don’t think there was another choice.’’

He said farmers wanted to be ‘‘rid of the problem’’ and make sure that it did not spread. ‘‘We have just got to put procedures in place to make sure that we’re in a good spot to move on from it.’’

New Plymouth’s National Party MP Jonathan Young said eradicating M Bovis would be the ideal solution ‘‘if that’s possible’’.

Young said the issue of protecting herds and animal welfare had to be balanced with the livelihoods of farmers.

Barbara Kuriger, National MP for Taranaki-King Country, said she was ‘‘pleasantly surprised’’ that it had been decided to try to eradicate the disease. ‘‘As a country we’re far better to be living without it. The real downside of what’s happened today is that some farmers are going to go through some really tough times. My biggest message now is to look after those affected farmers.’’

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor said the decision to not switch to a management and containment plan was made collectively with farming sector bodies after months of intense analysis to understand the likely impact of M bovis.

Phased eradication involves culling cattle on all infected properties and ‘‘high risk’’ properties – the bulk of that culling would be done in the next one to two years. The full cost of eradication over 10 years is estimated at $886 million – of this, $16m is loss of production and is ‘‘borne by farmers’’. The response, including compensation, is forecast to cost $870m and the Government will meet 68 per cent of the cost while DairyNZ and Beef+Lamb New Zealand will meet 32 per cent.