NZ Concerned Over Asian FMD Threat
WELLINGTON, New Zealand, 7 March 2001 -- Foot-and-mouth disease in Asia poses a major threat to New Zealand's economy and border and quarantine controls are being boosted to defend the country, the Government said today.
Agriculture and Biosecurity Minister Jim Sutton said the government was using a foot-and-mouth outbreak in Britain to boost quarantine controls and make people aware of the threat to the agriculture-based economy. "The first thing to say is the greatest risk from Asia," he said.
While New Zealanders were responding to television images of an outbreak of FMD among animals in Britain, there is an even greater threat from Asia, Sutton said.
People must realise that Asia, with 490 outbreaks of foot-and-mouth in the past year, was the main danger, he said.
"This Asian threat is not temporary. It is long term and ongoing," he said.
Travellers from Southeast Asia, except big city dwellers, were a potential hazard and should be treated seriously, he said.
"If the disease did become established in New Zealand, our living standards would drop at least 25 per cent," Sutton told reporters.
Source: AP/New Straits Times
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