Fiscal stress forces FMD ‘crowdfunding’
Mbongeni Mguni - Innocent Selatlhwa | Monday June 8, 2026 06:00
Estimates from the Ministry of Finance show that the Department of Veterinary Services, the traditional spearhead against FMD, actually suffered a marginal budget cut for 2026-27 financial year.
For the current financial year, the Department was allocated P496 million, down from about P500 million in 2025-26.
According to the budget approved by Parliament in February, about 83 percent of the funds were for salaries and allowances within the Department, while FMD was allocated P28 million, down from P29.3 million in 2025-26. The allocation was however, significantly higher than the P23.3 million allocated in the 2024-25 financial year.
After drought, FMD has become the costliest crisis in local agriculture. According to available records, the last outbreak in the North-East region in August 2022 cost government P180 million, including the costs of restocking the area using 10,000 cattle.
The last of these cattle was delivered in August 2025, months before the fresh outbreak was confirmed in February 2026, a fact that underlines the stress public coffers are under from the virus.
Detailing his 2026-27 budget to legislators in March, then acting Lands and Agriculture minister, Edwin Dikoloti, said the approach to fighting FMD had been changed and the responsibility of combatting the virus had been broadened beyond government.
“The approach is a multi-sectoral shared responsibility model which emphasises stakeholder vigilance, community involvement (through Mephato), and active participation from the private sector,” he said. “This transition moves away from a purely government-driven model.”
Dikoloti explained that government’s emphasis going forward would be based on a community-driven approach which protects the national livestock from FMD incursions by herding and kraaling animals, combating rampant cross-border livestock rustling and general crime.
“In the Bobirwa district, Mophato regiments led by Dikgosi and supported by law enforcement such as Police, BDF, Wildlife, serve as an extra layer of security, especially along the porous Botswana/Zimbabwe border. “This same arrangement will be extended to the other affected areas,” he said.
At the time of Dikoloti’s speech, FMD had only been detected in the virus-prone North East. Government mobilised emergency funding of P97 million in response, including for the purchase and deployment of vaccines, as well as significant human resource mobilisation. The funds were also used to beef up patrols along the South African border, including drone surveillance and the establishment of mini-command centres.
Despite the vigilance, FMD on April 2 was confirmed in the South, specifically at the secure Ramatlabama Artificial Insemination Laboratory, located in the most economically important beef area, Zone 11.
Zone 11 is the country’s second largest disease control zone and with government resources strained, Dikoloti has stepped up the private sector and community mobilisation effort.
“The successful containment of Foot and Mouth Disease requires a coordinated response involving government, the private sector, farmers and communities,” he said this week, while receiving a donation of 10,000 litres of fuel from Vivo Energy. “Partnerships such as this strengthen our capacity to respond effectively and ensure that frontline teams can continue implementing critical disease control measures in affected areas.”
At village level, mephato are out and about, patrolling border fences, making repairs, alerting law enforcement as well as leading the rally to comply with restrictions and calls for vaccination.
“Since 2023 until early this year, we were fighting crime, but things now have taken a different turn as we have had to face an unknown enemy,” Peter Malobola, the chairman of the Mabeleakgomo mophato from Mokatako-Molete told Mmegi recently. “We get to the border early in the morning and chase livestock away from there all day. “We even get calls at night when there is a situation and we react accordingly.”
While the private sector and community-led strategy represents a shared approach to tackling the burden, in remarks made in Ramotswa earlier this week, Dikoloti laid bare the fact that government’s finances are simply too stretched to attempt to rein in the virus alone.
'Deputy Permanent Secretary for Livestock Farming Dr Kefentse Motshegwa has started engaging with the Prisons Officials as we intend to use skilled prisoners to assist us build the containment fence,' he said, before adding: “Waiting for a fence to be erected can delay us in fighting the disease. “I call on you to start already by using tree branches to close gaps at the border and also to start the containment.”
In response to government’s call, Business Botswana’s Private Sector Disaster Response Fund, a combined humanitarian initiative, committed P1 million to strengthen national FMD containment efforts, while individual companies have also been coming to the party.
The Botswana National Beef Producers Union has activated its Disease Control Account and is gathering funds to assist in the FMD response.
While in previous years, all eyes were on how government would respond to an outbreak of FMD, this year, all hands are being called to be on deck.