Cattle mortality drops 23pc

Ashton Mutyavaviri

THE cattle industry has recorded a 23 percent decline in mortalities, thanks to the combination of improved animal husbandry and health management practices that include stringent control measures for tick-borne diseases.

Information in the Crops, Livestock and Fisheries Assessment Report (Pre-harvest) CLAFA-1 2023/24 Summer Season indicates that cattle mortality has dropped by 23 percent from six percent in 2022 to 4, 6 percent in 2023 due to enhanced animal farming and health management practices, particularly tick-borne disease control.

From the sampled beef cattle owners, the major causes of beef cattle mortalities were disease (68 percent), starvation (13 percent), injuries (6 percent), predators (5 percent) and others (8 percent).

Theileriosis (January disease) significantly affected provinces and their disease burden in 2023 was as follows: Manicaland had 1 260 animals affected with 436 deaths, Mashonaland Central recorded 471 cases and 106 mortalities. Mashonaland East on the one hand had 2 750 cases with a mortality of 592.

Mashonaland West province recorded 1 031 cases of and 432 mortalities while Masvingo recorded 2 046 affected animals and 723 mortalities. Matabeleland South was the worst affected province after recording 4 677 cases and 4 347 mortalities. The Midlands province had 2 424 cases and 1 490 mortalities while Matabeleland North was the only province with zero cases of animals affected and zero mortalities.

The drive to improve animal health and reduce mortality rate, which is key to herd growth saw the Government rolling out the Integrated Tick and Tick-Borne Disease Control Strategy (ITTBDCS), which comprised three components namely intensive cattle dipping, vaccination of cattle and acaricide resistance monitoring.

Dipping was reported to be adequate in 59 percent of the 1 562 rural wards whilst 41 percent was reportedly inadequate at the time of assessment.

Inadequate dipping is mostly attributed to a shortage of acaricides, non-filling of water in plunge dips, vandalism of dip tanks and lack of compliance by farmers.

Meanwhile, the Department of Veterinary Services (DVS) chief director Dr Pias Makaya said tick-borne diseases were on the decline due to regular and improved dipping although the department was continuing to get some adverse reports.