Mouth-and-mouth Disease Plagues Livestock, DKI Provincial Government Claims Meat Supply To Jakarta Hasn't Been Disrupted

Illustration (Photo: Antara)

JAKARTA - Livestock in a number of areas in East Java are infected with mouth and nail disease (PMK). The Ministry of Agriculture noted that 200 cattle have been confirmed to have FMD.

As a result of this outbreak, as many as 736 cows sent from East Nusa Tenggara to DKI Jakarta were detained at Tanjung Perak Port, Surabaya, East Java due to the animal FMD that was endemic in that area.

However, the Head of the DKI Jakarta Food, Maritime, and Agriculture Security Agency (KPKP), Suharini Eliawati, claims that the quantity of meat supply in Jakarta has not been disrupted so far.

"For now, we have not disrupted the supply because we have coordinated the preparation of the Lebaran (meat stock) until after this Eid," said Suharini when contacted, Thursday, May 12.

Furthermore, Suharini said that his party would tighten the traffic for livestock shipments sent from outside the region with the food task force involving the DKI Transportation Agency and the Jakarta Metro Police.

"We are tightening the traffic. Apart from seeing the animal health certificate, where the livestock came from, we will also see the physical clinical symptoms of the animal itself," said Suharini.

In addition, the DKI Provincial Government will also provide education to the community of breeders and managers of livestock animal shelters in Jakarta.

"What we emphasize is bio security. Then the honesty of our own breeders when was the last time we supplied their livestock, when to take them out, to where, that's what we can communicate to them," he explained. FMD was found in a number of cows in the area. So the local government then issued a regulation closing the entry and exit of cattle from the area.

Meanwhile, Minister of Agriculture Syahrul Yasin Limpo ensured that the handling and control of PMK in East Java was running well and under control. He said the Ministry of Agriculture fully supports the tiered efforts made by local governments in handling and controlling FMD in their respective regions.

Indonesia has been listed as free of FMD since 1986 and received international recognition in 1990. Minister of Agriculture Syahrul hopes that the various mitigation efforts carried out by his party together with local governments can optimally suppress the spread of FMD in a number of areas and bring Indonesia back as a FMD-free country.

“Indonesia has been a PMK-free country in Asia since 1990, and it turns out that a few days ago we had to deal with PMK. But from the results of tests and monitoring in the field, along with the number of infected with a low mortality rate, we hope that the FMD this time will be at a mild level," Syahrul explained in his statement.