The foot-and-mouth disease contagion presents a threat to Slovakia's economy, and if the disease were to spread across the country, it would endanger the entire agriculture and food industry sectors, with devastating economic consequences, President Peter Pellegrini told the media during his visit to Banská Bystrica on Tuesday.
Pellegrini asked all politicians to refrain from scoring political points from the situation and competing with each other as to who can apply the harsher criticism or bring more bombastic revelations. "This won't help us at all. Now's the time for us to join forces and together weather this difficult crisis, which is apparently continuing to spread from ground zero. We must do our utmost to slow it down, or Slovakia will face a difficult crisis with consequences that we can't even imagine today," he claimed.
According to Interior Minister Matus Šutaj Eštok (Hlas-SD) the declaration of a state of emergency will enable better coordination of forces and resources. The minister also called a meeting of the central crisis management team that would deal with synergies in preventing the spread of this highly contagious virus - managing rescue work, issuing orders for rescue work and implementing measures to deal with the emergency and mitigate its negative consequences.
Šutaj Eštok also reported that Slovakia has activated the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism via the Interior Ministry's crisis management department. "We've accepted assistance offered by Austria, which will provide a decontamination module. The same goes for an offer from the Czech Republic to provide two decontamination gates for equipment," added the Minister.
Representatives of the opposition parties lambasted the government over the way it's been addressing the spread of foot-and-mouth disease in Slovakia while underlining the gravity of the situation. They concurred that the government is failing to take action promptly and effectively enough. They called for the immediate adoption of measures and clear communication with the public.
"Whereas [agriculture] minister [Richard] Takáč (Smer-SD) claims that they've done everything right, according to our information they've made mistakes. We don't want to spread panic, we're really calling on minister Takáč to come and talk to the [parliamentary] committee [for agriculture] and tell us what kind of measures he's preparing," Progressive Slovakia (PS) vice-chair Ivan Stefunko stated after Takáč failed to attend a committee session.
KDH called on Prime Minister Robert Fico (Smer-SD) to take personal responsibility for the efforts to tackle the situation, and it plans to propose financial state support for farmers vis-a-vis disinfection measures as well as forming a permanent crisis team that would involve the participation of farmers.
On Thursday, March 27 SaS will organise a roundtable discussion for opposition representatives on the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, which, it warns, could have catastrophic consequences for Slovakia's agriculture. Representatives of PS, KDH and ‘Slovakia’ parties have already promised to attend.
"We've repeatedly extended a helping hand to the Agriculture Minister [Richard Takáč], which, unfortunately, he's brushed aside arrogantly. The opposition can't stay silent. Foot-and-mouth disease could cause serious economic damage, which is partly why we're convening a roundtable discussion for opposition representatives specialising in agriculture with an eye towards arriving at solutions to offer to the government," stated SaS MP Alojz Hlina.
On Wednesday morning Slovakia's chief veterinary officer Martin Chudy amended the extraordinary emergency measures to allow livestock from farms located outside the restricted zones to be transported to approved slaughterhouses in Slovakia.
The transport of animals from other countries to approved slaughterhouses in Slovakia is also permitted. This applies to cattle, sheep, goats, pigs and other cloven-hoofed animals, including farmed game. Any other transport of these animals, except for necessary transport within the same farm and transport to a slaughterhouse, remains prohibited.
Source: TASR
