Tour takes look at FMD risks

Mr Tilbrook and Esperance veterinarian Enoch Bergman were two West Australians in a contingent of Australian vets and sheep and cattle industry people on a study tour last month to Nepal to look at FMD.

Nepal is one of more than 100 countries across Africa, the Middle East and Eurasia where FMD is rife and the European Commission for the Control of Foot-and-Mouth Disease (EuFMD) is leading public education campaigns to try to contain and then eliminate it.

WoolProducers Australia (WPA) sponsored Mr Tilbrook, several Eastern States wool growers and other industry people on the tour, one of a number organised in conjunction with various industry bodies, the federal Agriculture Department and EuFMD.

The aim is to strengthen Australia's biosecurity by familiarising animal industry operatives with FMD and its symptoms to better equip them to recognise and report FMD, helping improve Australia's early warning and response capacity.

WPA is committed to FMD preparedness and has sent wool industry representatives, including producers, agents and private vets from all sheep-producing States in Australia to Nepal as part of this funding round.

Another study group with WPA sponsored members is in Nepal this week.

WPA sponsorship funding for tour participants comes from the health and welfare component of the Sheep Transaction Levy which it administers.

"There's quite a lot of work going on there (Nepal) at the moment on FMD, we were group 20 and there were also groups out of New Zealand," Mr Tilbrook said.

"It was pretty full-on, information overload, but from my point of view very interesting and extremely worthwhile," he said.

"I would recommend this invaluable trip to anyone who is interested.

"As someone who handles wool and livestock on a daily basis the opportunity to observe FMD lesions first hand was an invaluable experience.

"FMD is something that all producers hear about but this training encouraged me to think about what an outbreak would actually mean in an Australian context.

"It opened my eyes to the wider policies surrounding an FMD response in Australia and how they will impact not just on-farm activities but the whole wool supply chain, including the devastating implications for trade."

Mr Tilbrook said while technical information about the disease, transmission, diagnosis and response was interesting and important, the focus for him was on how an outbreak would be handled and what impact it would have on trading partners.

"I concentrated on our quarantine restrictions and how we can best protect our animal industries and put our trading partners like China, who buy most of our wool, at ease that we are on top of our biosecurity and actively preventing spread of disease."

The tour group was based in Kathmandu where theory sessions were held and travelled out to regional areas to visit goat, cattle and pig farms to give participants experience in identifying FMD.

Mr Tilbrook said an FMD outbreak was detected two days before they arrived.

At the end of the tour the group made a presentation of recommendations on managing FMD to the Nepalese government's agriculture department.

"Coming from a production and marketing background enabled me to provide practical input into the scenarios that we encountered, which in the event of an outbreak in Australia, will be just as important as the technical advice," he said.

While there were major differences in biosecurity and FMD risk between Nepal and Australia, animal husbandry practices would not necessarily work in a local farmer's favour if an FMD outbreak occurred, Mr Tilbrook said.

"Over there the farms are small and right next to each other - a bit like houses in the suburbs here - so an outbreak has the potential to spread from farm to farm and be difficult to contain," he said.

"But each farm might only have a dozen animals and they (farmers) live very closely with their stock so any symptoms of FMD are quickly picked up.

"Over here we might only see our animals up close three times a year.

"If for some reason an outbreak did occur, it could go through the whole flock before it was picked up."

While FMD is normally transferred from animal to animal by direct contact with saliva containing the virus, it could survive in wool and be spread by contact with wool, Mr Tilbrook said.

It could also survive in the damp "slurry" in a cattle yard for up to six months.

Although there was no risk, Mr Tilbrook said he had imposed a week-long quarantine of himself at Primaries' Bibra Lake office on his return from Nepal.

State and Federal agriculture departments describe FMD as one of the most serious livestock diseases.

It is an acute highly contagious disease and affects most cloven-hoofed animals including cattle, buffalo, camels, sheep, goats, deer and pigs.

It is characterised by formation of painful fluid-filled blisters called vesicles in the mouth and nostrils, on teats, and on the skin between and above hoofs.

It can be fatal, but usually only for old or very young animals.

It is not the same as the Hand Foot and Mouth Disease that infects humans.