Toll: $886m, 150k cattle
The Government says it has one last shot at eradicating the country of Mycoplasma bovis and it’s going to try.
Cabinet made a decision yesterday to push ahead with ridding New Zealand of the disease, which is on a scale never faced before.
Phased eradication could involve up to 190 properties out of more than
20,000 dairy and beef farms. It’s expected an additional 126,000 livestock will need to be culled on top of the
26,000 already earmarked for slaughter. 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.
‘‘Speaking with affected farmers in recent weeks it is obvious that this has taken a toll, but standing back and allowing the disease to spread would simply create more anxiety for all farmers,’’ Ardern said.
While it’s an ‘‘ambitious plan’’ Ardern said she didn’t want to end up in a situation where she looked back and said ‘‘I wish we’d tried harder’’.
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 ten 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.
Ardern said the Government had prepared for a ‘‘rainy day’’ in the Budget and was able to ‘‘carry a load like this’’.
O’Connor made a guarantee that affected farmers would receive a substantial amount of their compensation within 10 days of a claim being made.
‘‘We’re speeding up the process to ensure nobody is squeezed financially as a result of this process,’’ he said. Unfortunately ‘‘mass culls are necessary’’ because of the difficulty testing and identifying stock with the disease.
The alternative option was longterm management, projected to cost $1.2b, and if nothing was done, it’s estimated the cost to the industry would be about $1.3b in lost production over the next decade.
Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) director of response Geoff Gwyn said it was clear the outbreak is ‘‘one incursion and connected by the same network’’. That means it ‘‘keeps us in the game for eradication,’’ he said.
Spring testing this year will provide an opportunity to reassess whether
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eradication is working.
MPI expects more farms will be identified after spring testing but if they’re part of the same network then eradication would still be achievable, Gwyn said.
Federated Farmers supports the decision to try and eradicate but is well aware it will cause pain and anguish for more farmers.
President Katie Milne said getting rid of the disease is preferable to living with it for years on end.
‘‘Now we have to crack on and give it our best shot to recover from this threat.
‘‘But we have to remember the pain and trauma it is causing for the families involved now and sadly the ones who will be involved in the future.
‘‘We don’t even know who all those families are yet,’’ Milne said.
Affected farmers will get their own assigned case manager to deal with compensation and support.
The investigation into how M bovis got into the country is still under way.
And a further review into MPI’s biosecurity response will also be carried out.