The struggle to meet the animal health needs of developing farmers

Much is said about the need for transformation in the red meat value chain, especially among smallholder farmers in traditional authority areas and on land reform farms. Unfortunately, according to former government animal health technician Ginette Bentley, inadequate resources, vacant posts and a lack of cohesion hamper the process. Lloyd Phillips reports.

- Lloyd Phillips

Ginette Bentley is all too familiar with the challenges that small-scale livestock farmers face when trying to manage the health of their animals. She spent 15 years as an animal health technician with the KwaZuluNatal Department of Agriculture and Rural Development’s (KZN DARD) Veterinary Services division, finally resigning at the end of October to become an independent animal health consultant.

During her time at the department, Bentley was often called on to assist her colleagues with animal health initiatives, such as rabies mass vaccination campaigns, in various parts of the province.

Working mostly alone, she also sought to help the thousands of smallholder livestock owners within the uMngeni and MooiMpofana local municipalities, covering about 3 387km2, with their animal health needs.

“There are approximately 1,5 million cattle owned by smallholder farmers in communal traditional authority areas and on land reform farms across KZN,” says Bentley. “This excludes the hundreds of thousands of goats and, to a lesser extent, sheep, pigs, horses and poultry owned by many of these farmers. “The farmers rely heavily on the state to provide primary animal health care (PAHC). Unfortunately, the state is not always able to do this because its departments tend to overstretch their limited resources among many priorities, and services of national importance take precedence over PAHC.”

Yet properly and widely implemented PAHC is a key building block for transforming subsistence livestock owners into income-generating commercial farmers.