Report scathing of DEFRA`s handling of foot and mouth crisis
Farmers in the UK were breathing a sigh of relief today after initial tests for foot-and-mouth disease on a suspect pig proved negative. However, the news coincided with the publication of a report that showed last year's crisis cost the British taxpayer over £8 billion ($12 billion). Suspicions were also mounting that the alert - the first since September 2001 - was timed to deflect attention away from the report.
The pig was discovered at an abattoir in Leicestershire in the English Midlands and a ban on the movement of livestock within a five mile (eight kilometre) radius immediately imposed. The ban will remain in place until the results of final tests are known next week. Similar restrictions will also remain in place on 34 farms in the East Yorkshire area while vets determine which one the pig came from.
Compiled by the Government’s National Audit Office, the report reserves particular criticism for DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs - known as the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food at the time of the crisis). DEFRA’s performance was considered so poor that the National Audit Office has insisted on a review of planning for every single one of its departments.
The report also detailed how vets, valuers, slaughtermen, contractors and farmers all abused the emergency as the Government, desperate to bring the epidemic under control, paid premium rates. Stock valuations multiplied as the disease took hold, so much so that between February and May 2001, the average price paid for a cow soared from £500 ($750) to £1,500 ($2,250).
