FMD threatens to destroy domestic livestock industry

Nearly 10 percent of cows and pigs raised in Korea have been culled since November last year due to foot-and-mouth disease, with the number of culled animals Sunday hitting 1.28 million out of the country’s 13.2 million.

With losses from the mass culling snowballing, fears are rising that the domestic livestock industry will collapse.

“More than 70 percent of livestock in the region has been buried. We can say the livestock industry in Gimpo has collapsed,” an agricultural policy official based in Gimpo said Sunday.

“With the number of those slaughtered increasing, especially in the township of Wolgot in Gyeonggi Province, where large numbers of cows and pigs are being raised, farmers dare not raise livestock for a considerable amount of time.”

A combined 59,772 hoofed and even-toed mammals were culled in Gimpo, Gyeonggi Province, as of Sunday, or 73 percent of the combined figure of 79,811 in the region. The livestock industry in the area is therefore practically ruined.

A livestock farmer in Wolgot said, “Our livestock industry is at risk of disappearing due to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease after the outbreak in April last year,” adding, “I’ve made my living by raising livestock all my life. I don’t know what to do now.”

An official in Andong, North Gyeongsang Province, where the latest outbreak originated, also talked of the collapse of the livestock industry in the area. In Andong, almost 90 percent of the combined 174,000 cows and pigs are subject to culling.

Andong Mayor Kwon Young-sae said, “We’re struggling to save the industry by setting up two special task forces, but we’re at a loss over how to deal with the situation,” adding, “To prevent negative perception of our agricultural and indigenous products, we are preparing a promotional event targeting consumers in Seoul.”

Other areas are also suffering from the same situation. The disease hit North Gyeongsang, the nation’s largest producer of Korean beef; Gyeonggi, the largest grower of milk cows in the country; and South Chungcheong Province, the country’s largest grower of pigs.

Of the top three growers for indigenous Korean cattle, milk cows and pigs, South Jeolla Province, No. 2 in the country for native Korean cattle, is the lone province not to be affected by the disease.

Foot-and-mouth disease has also broken out in Hoengseong, Gangwon Province, whose Korean beef is considered the best in the country, and Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province, the country’s largest trading center for native Korean cattle.

A livestock industry official said, “Foot-and-mouth disease has affected regions home to large-scale livestock farmers,” adding, “We will suffer massive aftereffects down the road.”

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