Documents and tags which may have been used to smuggle calves into the Republic from Northern Ireland were seized in a raid on a farm in Mayo yesterday. The Department of Agriculture's special investigation unit, which was assisted by the Garda, also visited six more farms in Co Tipperary where more than 120 animals with no proper identification have been found either abandoned or on farms in the last month.
A Garda source indicated last night that the items found in Mayo were "significant" and would assist investigators in piecing together a full picture of smuggling activities.
The investigation, which began in the middle of last year, is expected to be extended to many other parts of the Republic as more information becomes available from raids which are being carried out daily. The Department of Agriculture said yesterday it still did not have figures for the final cull of ewes in the Cooley peninsula to reconcile with the number of ewe premiums claimed by farmers there. There is understood to be some major discrepancies on some farms there.
In the North, where already £1.5 million has been paid in compensation to farmers as a result of the outbreak in Meigh, Co Armagh, the Minister of Agriculture, Ms Brid Rodgers, said the RUC had intercepted six illegal movements of animals over the weekend.
Ms Rodgers said that despite pleas from her Department to prevent the spread of foot-and-mouth disease, some farmers were jeopardising the future of the North's farming industry by unlawful movement.
There was more bad news for the industry there yesterday with the announcement of the cancellation of Balmoral Show, the North's main agricultural event. It had been postponed from its usual dates in May to August but now has been called off because of the fresh outbreaks of the disease. As the number of cases continued to rise in Britain yesterday, the North Cumbria Health Authority reported that it was investigating the possibility that one of its staff involved in the slaughter and disposal of infected animals may have caught a human form of foot-and-mouth.
Tests were being carried out on the worker last night. If confirmed, this would be the first case of the disease in a human during the current outbreak. One person in Britain caught the disease during the 1967-68 outbreak.
Switzerland moved last night to ease a ban on imports from the Republic following the declaration that the State was free of foot-and-mouth disease for more than 30 days after the sole outbreak in Proleek, Co Louth.
In Dublin yesterday, the chairwoman of the European Parliament's environment committee, Ms Caroline Jackson, warned that Ireland and the Union would have to monitor carefully food products coming in from applicant countries to the EU, especially Poland, where slaughterhouse standards were not up to EU standards.
The committee, which was on a fact-finding visit to the EU's Food and Veterinary Office, was told there was a major problem keeping staff in Dublin and this could get worse when the headquarters was eventually set up in Grange, Co Meath.
Ms Jackson said the 90 veterinary inspectors who would be based in Grange carried out only 28 inspections worldwide on behalf of the EU. She was concerned they would be visiting South Africa only once this year, a country where foot-and-mouth disease was endemic.