Canada's mad-cow plight a warning

Confirmation of another case of mad cow disease in Canada has drawn a sympathetic response from a top New Zealand farming official.

New Zealand Meat and Fibre Producers chairman Ian Corney said his heart went out to the Canadian farmers affected.

"I was up there about 18 months ago and talked to them about the first outbreak and it was just devastating," he said.

The Canadian Government on Saturday confirmed a dairy cow had the disease, the third known case among North American cattle.

The news is a huge blow to Canadian beef farmers, as exports to the US, their biggest beef market, have been banned for the past 19 months, costing them at least C$5 billion ($5.8 billion).

Corney said New Zealand farmers would not want to be seen as benefiting from others' misfortunes, but that was sometimes the long-term result.

"We saw this with mad cow in Britain - there was an upsurge in lamb and mutton sales and we've seen that continue in the longer term."

New Zealand would not necessarily benefit directly from the latest Canadian misfortune as local beef products were quite different to their Canadian counterparts.

But Corney said the latest outbreak was a wake-up call, as it illustrated how such a disease could devastate an economy.

"I don't think there's enough money in the Reserve Bank to cover it if something like that happened here."

The Government and meat-processing plants were doing a good job to ensure New Zealand kept its reputation for food safety and, although that at times could appear draconian, the consequences would be enormous should something like mad cow disease ever take hold in this country.

Statistics New Zealand puts the total export earnings from beef at about $2.42 billion a year.