The Great Food Gamble

He hints that had we supported our own farmers, rather than importing from abroad, then the foot-and-mouth crisis could have been averted. ‘There’s no doubt that we should be much more cautious about the food we import,’ he says. ‘We do import meat from places where foot-and-mouth is endemic, like Latin America. It’s ludicrous, for example, that the army should be buying in meat, when there are clear benefits from home produce. It may satisfy the demands of the accountants, looking at the bottom line, but there are added costs – and, in particular, if you’re looking at foot-and-mouth, that could be billions of pounds.’

He is dubious about the policy of slaughtering, which has led to over 2.3 million animals being culled so far. ‘Had we gone for protective ring vaccination [where animals are vaccinated within a radius of 3km from the site of a confirmed outbreak] in the first instance, it could have helped, but I’m conscious of being wise after the event. It looks as though we’re through the worst, but it’s still not over. It’s hard to see how slaughtering millions of animals is the solution when you know the alternatives [particularly as one leading expert suggests that vaccinated animals are perfectly safe to eat]. We know a lot of the animals killed did not have the disease, so a very large number did not need to be slaughtered.’