A British farmer's road to foot-and-mouth ruin

It took just five hours for Ross Cherrington's livelihood to be destroyed. At first one cow stood with a swollen tongue in the middle of his barn in Devon, England, slobbering and shaking at 10 am on March 12.

By 3 pm, his 260 sheep, 60 cows and seven pigs had been handed a death sentence. Two days later they were destroyed.

The organic farmer is travelling through New Zealand with the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries to put a face to the British foot-and-mouth disaster.

He has been brought here as a warning to New Zealanders of the destruction this country would face if the disease surfaced here.

At home his farm is bare.

A New Zealand vet gave Mr Cherrington the diagnosis - right in the middle of lambing.

"We still had to get up and do lambing. Ewes were lambing right before they were being shot," he said.

"By the time we came to shoot all the cows, some had lost the hooves off their feet."

The Cherrington's farm was case number 100 in Britain.

The disease is endemic in parts of South Africa, South America and Asia - and is responsible for wiping out about 3 million animals in Britain.

"A foot-and-mouth outbreak in New Zealand - because it [the country] relies so heavily on exports - would be disastrous," Mr Cherrington said.

- NZPA

Feature: Foot-and-mouth disaster

World organisation for animal health

UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food

The European Commission for the Control of Foot-and-Mouth Disease

Pig Health/Foot and Mouth feature

Virus databases online