Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen held a media briefing outlining plans to eradicate foot and mouth disease in SA, including proposing it be declared a national state of disaster. However, the dairy and beef industry is sceptical that this will have the intended impact. The Minister of Agriculture, John Steenhuisen, on Wednesday, 14 January, updated Parliament on the status of foot and mouth disease (FMD) in South Africa, and called for it to be declared a national state of disaster.
He outlined the strategy and timelines to vaccinate the national herd to achieve FMD-free status. This includes targeted vaccination with imported and local vaccines, enhanced surveillance and an urgent legislative review. “This is a clear roadmap for the protection of our national livestock herd and the restoration of South Africa’s international standing in the agricultural sector.
Since losing our FMD-free status in 2019, our farmers have faced unprecedented challenges. I have received many pleas for help, from commercial to communal farmers, who have borne the heavy burden of the recent FMD outbreaks in the country,” he said. Addressing the farmers, he said, “We understand the financial and emotional toll that the outbreaks have had on your families and your livelihoods.
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We remain deeply sympathetic to the hardships you have endured; however, I want to assure you today that we have a plan that is both realistically achievable and technically sound. I must be frank with the nation: achieving FMD-free status is a monumental task that will not happen overnight.” The strategy will be implemented over 10 years, beginning with stabilisation and consolidation, before moving toward the eventual withdrawal of vaccination and final recognition of national freedom through vaccination by the World Organisation for Animal Health. Richard de Bufanos, the director of Modderfontein Dairy, lost millions of rands in revenue due to foot-and-mouth disease in mid-2025.
He vaccinated his herd, which has already been reinfected. “We have six dairies, and we had to watch each one get infected over a period of six weeks, and this is frustrating because this is completely preventable.” Each dairy has about 1,000 cows, and De Bufanos said the disease had cost each dairy about R6-million. Regarding Steenhuisen’s plan, he said: “I don’t know enough about the state of disaster.
But for me, that would have been more effective early on when you were trying to stop [the spread of the disease]. “If you want to set up roadblocks and bring in the army, etc, it would have been more helpful seven months ago when you were trying to stop the spread. That horse has bolted.
It’s too late for that. “What you’ve got to do now is you’ve got to put out the fire first, because this is a raging fire. And the state of disaster is not going to help you with that.
If anything, it’s going to hurt people’s ability to follow their business practices. It’s going to create more unemployment. It’s going to put people out of business. But I don’t know enough about it.
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