PRETORIA, South Africa — After months of mounting losses for livestock farmers, South Africa has launched its first locally produced foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) vaccine in about 20 years, a move officials say is central to containing the country’s most serious outbreak in years.
FMD is highly contagious among cloven-hoofed animals, especially cattle. While it is seldom fatal in adult animals, it causes painful mouth and hoof lesions that reduce feeding, milk output and weight gain, often forcing quarantine measures that disrupt farm operations and trade. South African producers have warned of heavy economic damage from movement controls, veterinary costs and export barriers triggered by outbreaks.
At a government briefing on Friday, Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen and the Agricultural Research Council (ARC) announced an initial pilot batch of 12,900 multi-strain doses, describing it as proof that local production capacity has resumed after a long gap. Authorities said this is the first domestic FMD vaccine release in roughly two decades (widely described as 20–21 years).
Officials say the vaccine rollout is part of a broader, phased strategy to stabilize the livestock sector. Government plans include scaling ARC output to 20,000 doses per week from March 2026, then ramping further to 200,000 per week from 2027. The target is to vaccinate a large share of the national herd—reported at about 12 million cattle—with long-term emphasis on reducing dependence on imports and building “vaccine sovereignty.”
The latest announcements come after earlier emergency procurement drives, including imported doses and commitments to expand supply through multiple channels. Public statements from South African authorities and allied policy briefings have also referenced plans to secure millions of additional doses by March, suggesting an aggressive near-term push to close immunization gaps in high-risk zones.
For farmers, the key test now is execution: whether supply can reach outbreak hotspots quickly enough to slow transmission before further market disruptions set in. Producer groups have criticized the pace and coordination of earlier responses, and some have threatened legal action, underscoring pressure on the state to deliver visible results in the next few months.
If the scale-up holds, South Africa’s restart of local FMD vaccine manufacturing could mark a turning point—not only in disease control, but in restoring confidence across the country’s cattle value chain.
