Business Daily (Nairobi)
Allan Odhiambo
19 September 2007
Nairobi — Growing demand for livestock farming is endangering the lives of millions of people around the world due to the risk of disease transmission, a new report by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says.
The population of livestock has significantly increased in all corners of the planet forcing the human population to give up space for the animals, says the report, adding that the rise in urban agriculture poses the danger of increased risk in transmission of disease from animals to humans.
With more communities that were previously practising subsistence agriculture taking to livestock rearing to maximise their earnings, Kenya's livestock population has been constantly on the rise.
"These developments have potentially serious consequences for local and global disease risks, which, so far, have not been widely recognised by policy makers," said FAO's chief veterinary officer Joseph Domenech.
FAO statistics show that globally, pig and poultry population and industrialised livestock sub-sectors have been growing at an annual rate of 2.6 and 3.7 per cent in the past decade. This has seen the vast majority of chicken and turkeys produced indoors.
Because industrial pig and poultry production relies on movement of live animals, the level of exposure to livestock borne disease tends to rise with the population.
According to FAO's findings contained in a policy brief titled Industrial Livestock Production and Global Health Risk, this change it rapidly taking root in developing countries where traditional systems are being replaced by intensive units.
"The movement of animals and the concentration of thousands of confined animals increase the likelihood of transfer of pathogens," the report says..
"Furthermore, confined animal houses produce large amounts of waste, which may contain substantial quantities of pathogens. Much of this waste is disposed of on land without any treatment, posing an infection risk for wild mammals and birds," FAO warned.
The director of Veterinary Services Joseph Musaa said though the dangers of disease transmission are real, there is no policy to regulate the cohabitation between man and livestock.
"The danger of man and livestock putting up together is high but we currently rely solely on public health measures to check disease outbreaks that may arise...in fact in most cases it is the consumers of the various products that are more at risk than even the producers, he said.
Kenya's biggest scare of human-livestock transmitted diseases came during the out break of the Rift Valley Fever (RVF) early this year that left more than 100 people dead and thousands of animals affected. Deadly outbreaks of Anthrax have also been reported in various parts of the country.
Analysts said flawed land policy also fuels Kenya's livestock production problems because most subsistence families have limited farming.
FAO said while the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus is currently of major global concern, the "silent" circulation of influenza A viruses (IAVs) in poultry and swine fever also needed to be closely monitored to check their spread.
"Production sites should not be built close to human settlements or wild bird populations; farms should be regularly cleaned and disinfected; the movements of staff and vehicles should be controlled and employees should be trained in biosecurity," advises FAO.
Joachim Otte, a livestock policy expert with the organisation said dependence on technologies of intensive animal food production systems could ease the pressure that is forcing households to introduce more livestock within their fold.
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