Ministry Of Agriculture Sets Procedures For Handling Sacrificial Animals Ahead Of Eid Al-Adha

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Agriculture has set a number of procedures for handling livestock as sacrifices ahead of Eid al-Adha, which aims to minimize the impact and spread of mouth and nail disease (FMD) outbreaks in Indonesia.

Director General of Livestock and Animal Health at the Ministry of Agriculture, Nasrullah, said that the sacrificial animals were imported from areas free of FMD and not from regencies and cities that are included in the red zone for the spread of FMD.

"Animals come from green areas, and do not come from regency-city areas that are included in the red zone or confirmed by FMD based on laboratory results," said Nasrullah as quoted by Antara, Friday, June 10.

In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture is also engineering the sea route as a distribution route for sacrificial animals to Java, and engineering the land route in Java to prevent the disease from spreading more widely.

The Ministry of Agriculture also collects data and disseminates PMK to traders of sacrificial animals and provides animal health checkpoints at centers for selling sacrificial animals which will be carried out by all district and city offices.

Nasrullah said his party had also issued technical instructions for the implementation of qurbani cutting during the PMK outbreak which could be followed in all regions. In addition, the MUI has also issued a fatwa and instructions regarding the criteria for animals that are legal to be sacrificed during the FMD outbreak.

Nasrullah said that the availability of sacrificial animals reached 2,205,660 as of June 10, 2022, consisting of cows, buffalo, goats and sheep throughout Indonesia ahead of Eid al-Adha.

Nasrullah said the projected need for slaughtering sacrificial animals is estimated at 1,814,402 heads, consisting of 696,574 cows, 19,652 buffalo, 733,784 goats, and 364,393 sheep.

"This projection considers an increase in the number of slaughtered sacrificial animals by 5 to 10 percent from the number of slaughters last year in 2021," said Nasrullah.