Lumpy Skin disease Challenge for livestock
News Kashmir Analysis
Livestock is an important sector of economy and is backbone for the prosperity of rural areas. Livestock provides livelihood to two-third of rural community. It also provides employment to about 8.8 % of the population in India. India has vast livestock resources. Livestock sector contributes 4.11% GDP and 25.6% of total Agriculture GDP.
But since sometime Lumpy Skin disease is emerging as a worrying and major challenge for the livestock of entire country including Jammu and Kashmir. Historically, the diverse diseases have posed great challenges to the livestock growth .
As a matter of fact, Lumpy skin disease (LSD) is a highly contagious viral disease of cattle and buffalo that causes relatively low mortality. It does not affect humans. The disease can result in animal welfare issues and significant production losses.
It is worth mentioning here that Jammu and Kashmir is one of the wealthiest milk-producing regions in the country. Kashmir reportedly produces an estimated 7.5 lakh litres of milk each day, it is among the world’s largest producers of milk. Thus the Lumpy skin disease is a major challenge.
Lumpy Skin Disease (LSD), an infectious viral disease among cattle continues to affect more cattle worrying farmers in Kashmir.disease is caused by a virus in the family Poxviridae, genus Capripoxvirus which affects cattle. “Agro-climates, communal grazing, biting-fly, and introduction of new animals are associated with the occurrence of lumpy skin disease,” a paper in Science Direct states.
Quoting farmers news agency KNO reported that though the mortality rate of LSD is not so high, animals infected with the disease are unable to produce enough milk even after they are cured, hitting their economy.
On the other hand, Additional Chief Secretary (ACS), Agriculture Production Department, Atal Dulloo, few days back reviewed status of vaccination for lumpy skin disease in all districts of Jammu and Kashmir.
In this regard, ACS had a meeting with Directors of Animal Husbandry Kashmir and Jammu, Chief Animal Husbandry Officers and District Animal Husbandry Officers of J&K besides other senior officers including experts from SKUAST.
Atal Dulloo set deadline of November 5 for completing carpet vaccination of eligible cattle population in all districts of UT.
By mid September, The viral outbreak has so far killed over 57,000 cattle across India.
Punjab was the second state after Himachal to ask the Centre to take action on the deadly infection. The Himachal Pradesh government had urged the Centre to declare Lumpy Skin Disease an epidemic.
