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Showing posts with label smallholders. Show all posts
Showing posts with label smallholders. Show all posts

Thursday, September 28, 2017

Smallholders worst affected by lumpy skin disease

The ongoing epidemic of lumpy skin disease is affecting largely the smallholder farmers’ leading to the warning by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), reports NaijaAgroNet.

In a position paper made available to NaijaAgroNet, FAO warned that even countries that have not been affected by lumpy skin disease so far but are considered at risk need to carry out risk-based vaccination to avert the spread of the disease, which can have devastating consequences for farmers, particularly smallholders.

Pointing out that for broader cattle vaccination to keep lumpy skin disease at bay, especially in Eastern Europe and the Balkans, and in areas where the risk is the highest.

Lumpy skin disease is a cattle pox virus transmitted by biting insects that can be deadly for cattle but does not affect humans. The disease used to be confined to Africa only. In 2013, it emerged in Turkey and then quickly spread through nine countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkans. 

At the height of the disease’s spread in Europe, countries hit by lumpy skin disease registered up to 200 outbreaks, which have led to significant economic losses – due to drops in milk production and reduced quality of skins – and the death of up to around 15 percent of the affected herds.

“Although the outbreak in Europe was contained in April following mass vaccinations, we have seen the disease resurface in recent months in Albania, Greece and Macedonia. It’s just another warning sign that the disease has not been fully contained yet and can keep spreading if we don’t step up efforts to control it,” said Ren Wang, FAO Assistant Director-General, Agriculture and Consumer Protection Department.

FAO urges governments across the regions at risk of lumpy skin disease to carry out vaccination campaigns, especially ahead of bug season, which usually starts in March, when infection rates are highest to prevent, control and eliminate the disease.

Preventive vaccination in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and northern Serbia, for example, would create a buffer zone and stop the disease from potentially spreading to neighbouring countries such as Hungary and Romania, which have been spared to date from the disease.

FAO warned that stamping out – the proactive culling of all animals on an infected farm – should be used as a last resort because stamping out can have a drastic impact on farmers’ livelihoods, particularly those of smallholders. If stamping out is considered necessary, FAO recommends for this to be used only in the case of clinically affected cattle, when the infection is confirmed by an authorized laboratory, and animals should be humanely culled and appropriately disposed of as soon as possible.

FAO has already played an important role in reshaping countries’ policies so that vaccination is used as a key measure to prevent lumpy skin disease, and to minimize stamping out.

“Despite the progress made in combatting lumpy skin disease, there are still some grey areas we need to focus on. For one, we need to understand better if lumpy skin disease can also be  transmitted from one animal to another via infected milk, for example, and if infected animals that do not show clinical signs could still spread the virus,” said Ren Wang, Assistant Director-General, FAO Agriculture and Consumer Protection Department.

“There is also a need for better regional coordination and heightened surveillance to deal more effectively with the spread of the disease,” Ren Wang said.

Isaac Oyimah/GEE
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Pix: Ren Wang

Saturday, March 14, 2015

Experts urge GMO protection for Small-Scale Farmers in Africa


NaijaAgroNet
A study by the Friends of the Earth International, African governments must do more to control the planting of genetically modified (GM) crops that could affect smallholders.

The environmental Non Governmental organization (NGO) says international agricultural company exercise too much power over safety and trade legislation related to GM organisms (GMOs) in Africa which result, to many governments ignoring the threats these crops may pose to local farmers, it says.

The report with the title “Who benefits from GM crops?” was released last February 23rd and looks at the quality of GMO legislation around the world.

It was gathered by NaijaAgroNet that In Africa, only Burkina Faso, Egypt, South Africa and Sudan produce GM crops commercially, according to the report and In contrast, it says, Angola, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe have strict controls on the growth and sale of GMOs.

Author Haidee Swanby, who is a researcher at the South Africa-based African Centre for Biosafety, which campaigns for food sovereignty, says the influence of pro-industry lobby groups lowers safety standards. Laws in many African countries are "essentially GMO-permitting" rather than safety focused, she says.

"The laws are there or are being developed, but they are the wrong laws promoting the interests of the wrong group," Swanby tells SciDev.Net.

Chidozie Anibueze/GEE
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