Collective responsibility

The recent outbreaks of African swine fever (ASF) and foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) are telling of a failure of the agricultural community on multiple levels. The stark reality of livestock farming is that the compromised integrity of individual agriculturists, auctioneers, traders, and processors of all sizes, and state veterinarian services is increasingly the greatest risk to the sustainability of the South African food system. As state departments and service delivery decay, and rural areas face heightened economic pressure, decisive leadership across multiple value chains is becoming a socio-economic imperative.

Most livestock industries are characterised as dualistic in structure, implying that a small number of producers produce more than 75% of the production output. The latter is often vertically integrated, with significant backward and forward linkages into the agronomy sector. On the contrary, there are hundreds of small farmers responsible for the minority of, albeit much-needed, output. The scale of operations of these two groupings might differ vastly, but it would be delusional to plot a strategy that does not consider the risk profiles of both of these worlds and the composition of their respective value chains. Even worse is living in the hope that state departments will recover the capacity to adequately service the small-scale world over the short term.

All of this is in equal measure the responsibility of the entire livestock industry. The days of shifting the responsibility of keeping farmers accountable solely to the government are over. Now, more than ever, our privilege to farm will be determined by how we, as an agricultural community, facilitate accountability and trust in our value chains.

We are realistically optimistic about the future, as there is so much within our control to mitigate the risks of disease outbreaks. For a start, we need to redefine the operationalisation of resources across livestock value chains. We are often guilty of trying to convince each other how unique and different each livestock industry is. Moreover, there is a strong sentiment that we should actively compete against each other as protein categories. On a production level, this is a fallacy. In the livestock industry, there is so much that can be partnered on – from traceability and extension services to veterinary services and business intelligence systems.

Shifting the responsibility of keeping farmers accountable solely to the government will only exacerbate the current disease spread. As industries we will have to regulate our own behaviour and take responsibility as a collective to conquer the scourge of disease outbreaks.