Islay Agricultural Show

Tuesday, August 07 2007

With the latest outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in the UK it is now certain that the annual Islay Agricultural Show, this coming Thursday 9 August, will be held without cattle and sheep. At the moment there is a complete ban on transporting live stock throughout the UK and parts of Europe to prevent this terrible disease from spreading. This however doesn't mean that the Islay Show will be cancelled, all the other activities will continue as planned. A meeting was held on Sunday and they decided to go ahead with the show, but without the livestock (cattle and sheep). The horses will be there as well as the dog judging, the High School Windband and Islay Pipe Band.

Many people will remember the last outbreak in 2001 as if it happened yesterday. Specially for the farmers this is a nightmare scenario. In 2001 Scotland had 187 confirmed cases of foot-and-mouth and more than one million cattle, sheep, pigs and goats were slaughtered either because they were infected with the disease or had possible contact with the virus.

Due to the isolated position of Islay it's not likely that the virus will spread here but the ban on transporting live stock will have an effect on farmers throughout the UK and Islay. The ban means that farmers will not be able to sell their animals because of the transport restrictions and it's most likely that meat prices will fall. In the meanwhile we have to keep our fingers crossed for the farmers...