Cyprus sheep farmers sound the alarm: foot-and-mouth disease threatens ruin — urgent demands to the minister

The Cyprus Union of Sheep and Goat Producers has sent an official appeal to Agriculture Minister Maria Panayiotou, demanding that financial support for the sector be provided immediately. The crisis has been triggered by the strict sanitary measures and restrictions introduced to combat the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, which has been recorded on the island since the beginning of the year. Livestock farmers stress that state bans on moving animals, delays in bringing young stock to market and falling purchase prices have placed an unbearable financial burden on their farms, threatening the complete closure of production facilities and disruption of supplies of products including the famous halloumi cheese.

In their letter, the producers outlined a package of specific anti-crisis measures. They are calling for direct subsidies for feed for the dairy herd, compensation payments for lambs and kids kept on the farms, as well as funding for storing unsold meat. In addition, the farmers insist on a thorough economic analysis of the situation and the creation of a permanent state compensation mechanism in the event of zoonotic diseases. According to them, even partial easing of the quarantine, such as permission to graze, can no longer offset the accumulated losses.

Despite the fact that foot-and-mouth disease poses virtually no threat to human health and is extremely rarely transmitted to people, its appearance delivers a devastating economic blow to the agricultural sector because of the need for mass culling of livestock. This appeal to the Ministry of Agriculture followed a wave of protests by Cypriot farmers: earlier, five of the country's largest agricultural organizations had already sent a joint letter to President Nikos Christodoulides, saying that livestock farming was in a critical state because of the virus that came from the northern part of the island.