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Japan finds new suspected case of cattle disease

TOKYO: Japan's Agriculture Ministry said on Monday it discovered a new case of suspected foot-and-mouth disease among cattle at a farm in southern Japan, raising fears of an epidemic that could threaten the nation's livestock industry.

The ministry said in a statement it had found 16 head of cattle in the farm in Miyazaki prefecture infected with what was thought to be foot-and-mouth disease.

It was the prefecture's third suspected incidence of the fatal and highly contagious livestock disease in less than a month.

The ministry also officially banned imports of beef and pork from South Korea, effective immediately, because of an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease there.

Meat imports from South Korea had already been suspended since March 27, and the ban is likely to be a serious blow to that country's livestock industry, since Japan is its biggest pork export market.

South Korea last on Wednesday confirmed an outbreak of the disease among cattle near the town of Paju, northwest of Seoul, based on tests performed by the Institute of Animal Health in Britain.

Just one day earlier, Japan had confirmed its first case of the disease since 1908.

The latest outbreak was discovered on a farm about 20 km (12 miles) from the cite of the first case.

Authorities are still trying to determine how the disease made its way to Japanese soil.

DAMAGE TO JAPAN INDUSTRY SEEN LIMITED

So far, 22 head of cattle have been destroyed in Japan, all from farms in Miyazaki prefecture, and the 16 cattle at the third farm have also been ordered destroyed.

A trader at a Japanese feedmaker said, however, that the disease appeared to be limited to one area of the prefecture and he saw little cause for worry about the disease spreading throughout Japan.

Miyazaki prefecture and two neighbouring prefectures account for about a quarter of all cattle and hogs raised in Japan.

On Sunday, South Korea's veterinary service reported a fresh incidence of the disease southwest of Seoul. All 32 head of cattle at the farm where the disease was found would be slaughtered to prevent it from spreading, it said.

So far South Korean authorities have destroyed 133 hogs and head of cattle and there are worries the disease may spread more widely.

Trade sources say there is less potential for damage, however, to the Japanese industry, which exports only negligible amounts of beef and pork.

Although South Korea's livestock industry does not export beef, it had set a target of $400 million in export sales of pork this year, almost all of it for Japan.

An outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Taiwan in 1997 forced authorities to slaughter a quarter of the island's 14 million pigs and decimated what had been a $1.55 billion-a-year pork-export industry.-Reuters