Saturday, March 10, 2012

Ontario finally moving on diseases



A couple of years after it passed legislation enabling it to tackle outbreaks of highly-contagious diseases, the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs is saying that it will soon post a list of those diseases and invite public comment.

The main thing that has been done so far is the appointment of a chief veterinary officer with power to move swiftly to contain an outbreak of a foreign animal disease, such as hoof and mouth disease in livestock or avian influenza in poultry.

The ministry’s new regulations will force prompt reporting of an outbreak and will outline compensation for farmers, designed to offset any hesitation they might have about reporting a disease in their herd or flock.

The federal government already has the legislative power to do what the province is proposing. It has found there is a difficult line to walk on compensation – enough to encourage reporting, but not so much that farmers are happy to get a disease because the compensation is generous.