MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina downplays FAM outbreak losses

Argentina's Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Food minister Miguel Campos said Monday that losses because of the latest outbreak of Foot and Mouth disease in the northeast will be limited to 20% of the country's meat exports.

"In spite of the significant impact we were all expecting, we're assessing losses and they are in the range of 20%", said Mr. Campos Monday before leaving for Chile, one of the several countries that has banned the import of Argentine meats.

"Given the importance of what has happened we should underline that it won't be as serious as anticipated particularly if we are negotiating to reopen markets which have been closed to Argentine beef", he added.

Argentina's meat exports are in the range of 1.4 billion US dollars annually and losses because of the FAM outbreak could reach 280 million US dollars, estimated the Argentine government.

However Luciano Miguens president of the Argentine Rural Society, the largest and most influential farmers' organization in Argentina, described the situation as a "strong blow" to cattle breeders.

"If the situation can be controlled on time, Argentina will be exporting 200/300.000 tons less this year equivalent to 700 million US dollars", said Mr. Miguens recalling that the markets now banned include Russia, Chile, Israel the top three importers of Argentine beef.

Besides the fact, "we're waiting to see how the European Union reacts which will have a direct influence on the special Hilton cuts (28.000 tons), that are of the best quality and bring the highest prices", continued Mr. Miguens.

Mr. Campos said the "biggest loss" was the Chilean market, since this has become one of the main markets for Argentine beef, both in volume and price and thus his trip to Santiago. Nevertheless he discarded the "tremendous" impact forecasted since "Russia and the EU have limited their meat bans to the province of Corrientes" where the FAM outbreak was confirmed.

"Our export abattoirs, I'd say 99% of them will continue to operate without any major setback", insisted Mr. Campos.

But Mario Llambías from the Argentine Rural Confederations said there's great concern over the possible loss of the status of "free of FAM with vaccination", a condition Argentina only recovered in late 2003 following the livestock health crisis of 2001.

"We're all hoping that the sanitary measures imposed will avoid the FAM outbreak expanding to the south, to the provinces of Santa Fe and Buenos Aires where most of the Argentine (and best quality) herd breed", added Mr. Llambias.

As to the origin of the outbreak Mr. Miguens recalled that Corrientes province is an area which has been under very strict sanitary monitoring so, "either the virus mutated or outside cattle was introduced (smuggled) into the zone".

"The virus has appeared in an area where last December there was no presence of FAM", added Mr. Llambías. The outbreak is "most surprising" since it occurred in a border area "considered of high risk and with double coverage".

Apparently Argentine sanitary authorities believe the introduction of outside cattle could be the origin of the outbreak. However results won't be known until a couple of weeks when samples sent to Panaftosa in Brazil, South America's leading FAM lab, are returned to Argentina.

Meantime Argentine sanitary authorities decided to eliminate all the cattle belonging to the farm where the outbreak was reported. Originally the sanitary rifle was to be applied to the 70 cattle with the symptoms and the surrounding paddocks.