Japanese PM pledges fighting against livestock disease spreads

Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan on Saturday vowed to do the utmost to curb the further spread of foot- and-mouth disease that has ravaged livestock in Miyazaki Prefecture, according to local media reports from Japan's southwestern region.

Kan told local farmers that the government is taking this problem very seriously and will supply resources as well as financial aid to held rehabilitate the region's battered local livestock trade and make every effort to prevent the further spread of the disease.

"We will take steps to reconstruct their farms in a responsible manner," local reports quoted the premier as saying.

The reports also said that local farmers explained to the prime minister that the government must find the source of the spread of the disease and bring the catastrophe to an end.

The farmer went on to explain to Kan that it will take several years to rehabilitate the livestock business, and the government had to support the reconstruction.

Miyazaki Governor Hideo Higashikokubaru said that he wants the state government to bear the responsibility of all the expenses to deal with the disease and to extend full support for the reconstruction of the livestock and other relevant industries.

The government has already pledged 100 billion yen (1.1 billion U.S. dollars) in emergency funding for the Miyazaki region to stem the outbreak and support affected farmers.

The prime minister's trip to the prefecture followed fresh confirmation of livestock infected with the disease in the cities of Miyakonojo, Hyuga and Miyazaki since Wednesday, sources close to the matter said.

The epidemic threatens to ravage the country's trade in prime marbled beef, considered a delicacy in Japan.

Miyazaki, on Japan's southernmost main island of Kyushu, is one of Japan's top beef producers and sends calves to other cattle- producing regions across the country, including the area that produces the famed Kobe beef brand.

It remains unknown how foot-and-mouth disease came to Miyazaki Prefecture, home to thousands of small farms that supply the Japanese gourmet beef market. But the epidemic of the disease, which causes sometimes fatal fevers and blisters in livestock but very rarely affects humans, has reached critical levels in the region since it surfaced on April 20.

Source: Xinhua