Angola bans live cattle imports from Botswana

BONIFACE KEAKABETSE
Correspondent | Tuesday May 21, 2013 00:00

 

Addressing farmers at a Kgotla meeting in Maun last Friday, the Botswana Meat Commission (BMC) executive manager (strategy and management) Dr Stephen Ghanie told the farmers that the long envisaged deal faltered at the last hurdle. Despite reports that a number of Angolan businessmen had shown interest in buying cattle from the FMD ravaged Ngamiland, that country's veterinary authority reportedly refused to grant an import certificate. On the other hand, the Namibians are also not willing to grant a pass certificate to allow Angolan-bound cattle to pass through their territory by road from neighbouring Botswana.

Negotiations between the Botswana, Namibia and Angolan veterinary authorities for this deal started last year.Ghanie told the farmers that Angola says that they can only buy cattle from FMD green areas in Botswana, not Ngamiland.Meanwhile, Dr Ghanie dropped another bombshell at the gathering with another unpopular revelation that the majority of communal farmers in Ngamiland have been left out of the Zimbabwean live cattle export deal.  The deal will for now only cover farmers from the Hainaveld farms and Zones 2a and 2b while 2c FMD red spot areas, constituting the largest communal cattle farming zone in Ngamiland, will not be covered.He said the veterinary officials from Zimbabwe, after coming to Botswana for assessments a few weeks back, said they would only buy cattle from fenced areas in Ngamiland.

However, an exception was made on 2a and 2b communal zones, starting from the Ikoga veterinary fence all the way to Gudigwa on the other side of the Okavango pan handle. Dr Ghanie said part of the new deal is that cattle will be put under 21 days surveillance for FMD checks before being transported to Bulawayo for slaughter. BMC and the Zimbabwean Cold Storage Commission entered into a deal for sale of cattle from the FMD areas in Botswana. Last year only Ngamiland, which has been under an FMD outbreak since 2007, exported to Zimbabwe but the deal was soon cut short as CSC reportedly breached some of the payment agreements. A new deal has been initiated and will now cover Ngamiland and the Bobonong areas in the Zone 7.  More than 1,000 steers will be exported weekly from Ngamiland and Zone 7, Dr Ghanie said

Meanwhile Dr Ghanie told Mmegi in an interview that cattle farmers in the Chobe District will not be extended the courtesy to export their cattle saying Chobe is also a fully-fledged FMD red zone as buffaloes are in regular contact with cattle. Buffaloes are carriers of the virus causing FMD. In an earlier interview with this reporter, the MP for Chobe, Gibson Nshinwe, protested that farmers in his constituency also wanted to sell cattle to Zimbabwe as other farmers living in FMD areas.  Chobe's cattle are only sold locally within the district as farmers cannot sell to BMC due to FMD.Market opportunities currently exist in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mozambique and Zambia. Dr Ghanie said the Zambians have reportedly shown interest although the prices they propose are said to be low. 

On a different issue, Dr Ghanie told Mmegi that BMC is currently contemplating a joint venture partnership with a South African company, Fryees Meat Processing to set up a processing plant at the Maun abattoir for beef export to South Africa. Currently, cattle slaughtered at the Maun abattoir is pre-cooked for canning in Lobatse.   Dr Ghanie said however, BMC does not have the capacity and industry standard technology for meat processing at the Maun abattoir hence the envisaged partnership with Fryees.