Published Date: 2022-05-19 22:20:54 BST
Subject: PRO/AH> Foot & mouth disease - Indonesia (05): cattle, st O, spread, regional impact
Archive Number: 20220519.8703361
FOOT & MOUTH DISEASE - INDONESIA (05): CATTLE, SEROTYPE O, SPREAD, REGIONAL IMPACT
A ProMED-mail post http://www.promedmail.org
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Date: Thu, 19 May 2022
Source: Asia Times [edited]
https://asiatimes.com/2022/05/indonesias-cattle-under-threat-from-two-diseases/
Indonesia's dairy and cattle industries are in danger from a resurgence of deadly foot and mouth disease (FMD) and an outbreak of another viral scourge known as lumpy skin disease (LSD), both of which require a mass vaccination program if they are to be brought under control.[The LSD -related segment is omitted from this media report. - Mod.AS].
The agriculture minister declared an emergency after outbreaks of FMD in what industry sources say is now as many as 16 provinces, encompassing parts of Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Bali and Lombok. It's the first time the disease has been detected in Indonesia since 1986.
[Neither] disease is harmful to humans, but can have a devastating impact on livestock production and international trade, particularly for primary-producing countries like Australia and New Zealand, the biggest suppliers of live cattle and milk products to Indonesia.
In a recent Southeast Asian Beef Market Report, veterinarian Ross Ainsworth warned that East Java's proximity to Bali, where Australian tourists are rediscovering their favorite holiday destination, presents "a greatly heightened risk of disease transmission to Australia".
First detected in mid-April [2022], industry sources say this year's Ramadan celebrations a fortnight later only exacerbated the FMD problem, with the government apparently unwilling to shut down markets as a crucial first step toward controlling the spread of the disease. For now, they say, the Agriculture Ministry will have to focus on a selective vaccination program targeting the worst-hit areas until they have sufficient stocks to take a more holistic approach. As one trade official put it: "They will have to live with it and just chip away."
FMD has wider implications
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About 43% of Indonesia's 16.6 million head of beef cattle is grown on Java and another 25% on the eastern Nusa Tenggara island chain. Similarly, half of its 500 000 dairy cows are found in East Java, mostly tended by small village co-operatives.
FMD has wider health repercussions for pigs, sheep and goats and is spread through an animal's breath, saliva, mucus, milk and feces. FMD captures the most media attention, largely because of the drastic measures Britain was forced to take in the early 2000s, killing more than 6 million cows and sheep in what was eventually a successful effort to eradicate the disease.
How FMD re-entered Indonesia is open to speculation, but officials believe it was in infected sheep and goats smuggled across the Malacca Strait from neighboring Malaysia, where the disease is endemic. "That's the most plausible hypothesis," says the trade official, "but there is no smoking gun." Some suspicion also rests with Indian buffalo meat, which Indonesia began importing in annual quantities of up to 100 000 tones in 2015, 4 years after Australia temporarily suspended live cattle exports over animal welfare concerns.
Pork leftovers from airline meals fed to pigs has been widely blamed for the outbreak in Britain, while in the Philippines, frozen meat from India - where FMD is also endemic - was suspected of allowing the disease into the island of Luzon in the mid-1990s. Strangely, Indonesian officials don't list that hugely profitable business as a possible cause of the outbreak. The actual meat itself isn't a problem, but livestock experts say the danger lies in embedded bone chips which can carry the disease.
Whatever the cause, the outbreak is a major disappointment for Australian animal husbandry scientists who helped Indonesia eradicate FMD in a concerted campaign through the 1970s and early 1980s after remaining unchecked for more than a century. The new outbreak is not expected to disrupt the still-thriving live-cattle trade with northern and western Australia, given the fact that the 400-500 thousand animals shipped to mainly Sumatran feedlots each year are usually slaughtered after 90 days.
Imports making up for shortfalls
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Its quest for beef self-sufficiency stalled, the Indonesian government has continued to import the low-quality Indian meat to make up for an ongoing shortfall and to reduce the country's reliance on costlier Australian beef imports.
Although the state-run Bulog logistics agency has set the price of Indian beef at 80 000 rupiahs (USD 5.4) a kg, it is typically being sold for Rp120 000-130 000 (USD 8.2-8.8) in wet markets, not that far below the Rp168 000 (USD 11.6) price tag for quality feeder beef.
[byline: John McBeth]
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communicated by
ProMED
[On 9 May 2022, Indonesia submitted an immediate notification to the OIE (20220511.8703175), reporting confirmed FMD outbreaks which had started about a month earlier in 2 provinces: East Java (4 districts) and Aceh (one district).
As of 18 May 2022, the following provinces are regarded seriously suspected or confirmed according to Indonesia's media sources: North Sumatra, Bangka Beltung, West Kalmantan, South Kalmantan, West Java, Central Java, Yogyakarta, Bali and West Nusa Tanggara. For a map presenting Indonesia's provinces, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinces_of_Indonesia#/media/File:Indonesia,_administrative_divisions_-_en_-_monochrome.svg.
The virus seems to have spread throughout vast territories in several islands; this may be indicative of an unnoticed circulation during a yet-to-determined source / route of introduction / and period, prior to the notification.
Indonesia's due follow-up report is expected to include information on the new confirmed outbreaks, as well as about the mass vaccination, in case already initiated and under way. According to published information from the Ministry of Agriculture, the FMD virus strain involved is of serotype O, topotype ME-SA, lineage India 2001. - Mod.AS]
