Farming groups have called for more government investment to protect UK biosecurity as African swine fever and foot and mouth cases rise in Europe.
Representatives from the National Farmers’ Union and National Pig Association, alongside former minister of state Lord Rooker, yesterday called for a cross-government biosecurity plan and investment to prevent crippling costs and to protect domestic food production.
“Plant or animal diseases pose a significant risk to the UK’s food security, which this government has repeatedly stated is critical to national security, especially when coupled with increasing global instability and the impact that can have on the UK’s food supply,” said NFU president Tom Bradshaw.
Bradshaw warned that disease outbreaks would impact the national economy and the UK’s ability to trade, citing the £6bn-worth of animal and plant products exported in 2024 which relied on the UK’s biological security reputation.
Germany reported an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in January and there have now been several more cases confirmed in Hungary and Slovakia.
Concerns from groups are that the risk of it spreading to the UK is high, with illegal meat entering the country every week for which there is currently no deterrent.
“It’s done by major crime gangs who are making a lot of money out of bringing illegal meat into this country,” said Rob Mutimer, chair of the National Pig Association. “We must get some way of actually penalising these crime gangs, because they see us as a very lucrative market at the moment and we’ve got a nearly open-door policy for bringing it into the country.”
He added that both successive governments have not “taken the issues seriously enough”.
“The recent outbreaks of foot and mouth disease – a disease which still haunts the memories of so many in our sector – across Europe are hugely worrying for British farmers, and we must do everything to prevent it crossing the Channel,” added Bradshaw. “And FMD is not the only risk. New breakouts of African swine fever and known plant diseases like Xylella and tomato brown rugose fruit virus continue to be reported across Europe.”
To protect against this the NFU has asked for sufficient veterinary capacity in the Animal and Plant Health Agency to prevent and control diseases, for the government to cover the costs of veterinary surveillance visits through a central fund, a vaccine fund to cover emergency vaccination cost, a £1.5m Virus Yellows Resilience Fund and a fully funded Bovine TB strategy.
The NFU has also called for adequate import controls for plant protection material as the current border checks are “undermining” biosecurity interest, said NFU horticulture and potatoes chair Martin Emmett.
Emmett added that there was no “transparency” in the current model as Defra hasn’t published the data about what it is doing on the border.
“We pay an inspection fee, but we don’t know how much is actually being inspected,” he added, citing data that the inspection rate for tomatoes was at 100% this time last year but had fallen to 30% by September.
These calls were echoed by iundustry body the Association of Independent Meat Suppliers, who in a letter to Defra secretary Steve Reed this week warned of an “imminent risk to the UK” from animal disease, but said there was “little confidence within the industry that the Animal and Plant Health Agency possesses the capability or resources to effectively detect or control an exotic disease outbreak”.
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