Mycoplasma bovis: Consultation opens on moving eradication programme to National Pest Management Plan

DairyNZ, Beef+Lamb New Zealand, and the Ministry for Primary Industries are seeking farmers’ views on the M. bovis Eradication National Pest Management Plan. Photo / Ben Fraser

Farmers are being encouraged to have their say on a proposal to move the Mycoplasma bovis (M. bovis) eradication programme into a National Pest Management Plan (NPMP) as the cross-sector effort moves to a new phase.

M. bovis governance group independent chairman Kelvan Smith said eradication partners DairyNZ, Beef+Lamb New Zealand and the Ministry for Primary Industries wanted farmers’ views on the NPMP.

“All our evidence indicates we are in the tail end of the outbreak, meaning we are focused on building evidence that M. bovis is not present, rather than tracing risk events associated with active infection in our national herd,” Smith said.

Good progress had been made, with no active confirmed infection in New Zealand, but it hadn’t been an easy task, he said.

“The three partners recognise this and wanted to ensure that the ongoing activity causes minimal disruption to farmers.”

OSPRI has been nominated as the management agency in the NPMP proposal.

There were “natural synergies” in running the M. bovis programme alongside the National Animal Identification & Tracing (NAIT) and the TBFree Programme, with potential for up to $15m in savings across the three programmes, Smith said.

“We all know how crucial the NAIT system is for the timely tracing of cattle that may have been in contact with infected cattle, and the programme can achieve efficiencies by aligning some aspects of M. bovis testing alongside TB testing.”

Combining resources and capability would allow the programme to continue to adapt to the work that remained and help strengthen New Zealand’s biosecurity system, Smith said.

Farmers’ efforts and sacrifices “cannot be overstated”, he said.

“The improvements we’ve seen to on-farm biosecurity are heartening.”

Smith said farmers had been significantly affected by M. bovis, but had also played an important role in the programme’s progress.

“We owe it to the wider sector to continue building on these successes.”

The administrative model worked well and provided the necessary support and resources, Smith said.

“With the next few years focused on background surveillance, a different model, and some different capability, is required to ensure we are getting the best value for the taxpayer and farmer levy payers.”

While it is expected farmers and rural groups directly affected by M. bovis will notice little difference under the proposed model, programme partners are seeking feedback on some changes, including:

• Establishment of a national plan, with OSPRI appointed as the agency to administer the programme and manage the disease to achieve eradication;
• Formalising disease control activities through a set of 15 rules to support the eradication objective; and
• New reduced national plan levy to finance the remainder of the programme.

The NPMP opened for consultation on Monday, August 14.

“We want to hear from New Zealanders to ensure we end up with a model that works for everyone, especially our farmers who are most impacted by M. bovis,” Smith said.

While there was no known active infection, it was possible more would be identified before “we can declare the job is done”, he said.

“The proposal includes contingency arrangements for OSPRI to eradicate any small numbers of cases of infection subsequently identified in future.”

Feedback on the draft proposal is being sought from the public, especially from those who play an important part in the ongoing success of the eradication effort including farmers, meat and dairy processors, testing labs, and vets.

All are invited to provide feedback during the public consultation from August 14 to September 25.

M. bovis programme numbers, August 14

• Active confirmed properties – 0
• Cleared confirmed properties – 280
• Notices of direction (NOD) applied to properties – 2674
• Tests completed – 3288,732
• Compensation - total paid – $256.2 million
• Compensation claims paid – 2901

— Source: Ministry for Primary Industries