Farmers and veterinarians have warned that the government’s announced programme of mass vaccination against foot and mouth disease (FMD) is unlikely to be realised, given the absence of sufficient vaccine supply and the regulatory barriers preventing private production.
They argue the term “mass vaccination” is misleading, as SA has a national herd of about 14-million cattle but will only receive two-million imported doses by February 2026. Veterinary experts caution the current plan amounts to a limited extension of vaccination zones rather than a comprehensive national rollout.
CEO of the Sernick Group — which specialises in stud farm and commercial farming — Nick Serfontein, in his personal capacity, has been among the most vocal critics, noting the beef industry has already lost R1.5bn in the past six months due to export suspensions and domestic price suppression.
The red meat sector contributes roughly R48bn annually to the economy, with exports exceeding R7bn in 2023, driven by markets in China, the Middle East and the US.
Stud breeders warn that under current rules, high-value genetic assets face liquidation, while communal farmers are forced into non-compliance to survive.
“We cannot vaccinate nationally if we do not have vaccines,” Serfontein said, adding that private laboratories with the technical capacity to produce vaccines remained barred under the Animal Diseases Act of 1984, which classifies FMD as a state-controlled disease.
Not a mass rollout
Veterinary experts have echoed this assessment. Danie Odendaal, director of the Veterinary Network, explained that SA lacks the organisation, budget and vaccine supply to vaccinate all animals at once. “What is being described is a change in direction, vaccinating beyond the immediate outbreak zones, but it is not a true mass rollout,” he said.
Odendaal added the 12-month restriction on movement after vaccination was a legacy of “clean country” protocols, inappropriate for SA’s endemic status, and that regulations must be amended to allow a “vaccinate to live” policy.
In a media statement on November 26, agriculture minister John Steenhuisen acknowledged that KwaZulu-Natal remained the epicentre of the outbreak, with 180 of the 274 unresolved cases nationally, and conceded that “this is a battle we are currently not winning”. He confirmed that 931,200 animals had been vaccinated in the preceding three months, but uncontrolled animal movement continued to undermine containment.
The minister announced intensified vaccination in Estcourt and surrounding zones, limited relief measures for compliant farmers, and partnerships with industry bodies such as the Milk Producers Organisation, which purchased 50,000 doses for dairy farmers. He pledged delivery of two-million doses by February 2026, the establishment of a mid-scale domestic vaccine facility, and formalised public private partnerships with Onderstepoort Biological Products, the Agricultural Research Council and international partners including China and Argentina.
“This strategy aims to vaccinate South Africa’s national herd systematically, beginning with the hardest-hit provinces,” he said, adding that success would depend on consistent vaccine supply and stricter enforcement against illegal animal movement.
No vaccine sovereignty
Yet Serfontein and Odendaal remain unconvinced. Both argue that the government’s assurances mask a structural problem, the absence of vaccine sovereignty. Serfontein warned that without enabling private laboratories to produce vaccines, the country would remain dependent on limited consignments from Botswana and ad hoc purchases by industry bodies.
Odendaal reinforced that point, noting that the ARC’s registered polyvalent vaccine was limited to about 40 000 doses — enough for a single feedlot — and that the refusal to license private production had created a bottleneck. He described it as a “lack of leadership” and said the system had been broken for years, citing the disbanded foot and mouth commission of 2021–22, whose recommendations were never implemented.
Both, therefore, have called for regulatory reform to allow private laboratories and veterinarians to produce and administer vaccines under state supervision. They argue that this would expand supply, accelerate rollout and reduce the incentive for illegal animal movement.
Steenhuisen has insisted that private laboratories cannot produce vaccines because they lack access to FMD antigens and that vaccine development requires years of research. He has pointed to the ARC’s pentavalent vaccine as evidence of progress and confirmed that the government was working with OBP and international partners to secure supply. “There’s nothing wrong with importing vaccines as long as such vaccines match strains being targeted and it’s cost-effective,” he said.
Regulatory barriers vs scientific constraint
The disagreement is therefore fundamental. Farmers and veterinarians see regulatory barriers as the main obstacle to vaccine sovereignty, while the minister frames the issue as a scientific constraint that only state-led partnerships can resolve. This divergence underlines why industry stakeholders remain sceptical of the promised mass vaccination campaign.
The beef industry, valued at R48bn, faces mounting losses if export restrictions persist, with billions more at risk in 2026. The dairy sector, with a commercial herd of 1.27-million head and exports exceeding 150-million kilograms in 2025, is also exposed to movement restrictions and disease spread.
This dispute has been a long time coming. In 2016, former agriculture minister Thoko Didiza appointed a task team to draft a 10-year veterinary strategy. Five years later, another team was appointed to review progress, but the 2022 final report concluded that “animal health in South Africa is a mess” and that no meaningful improvements had been made. Odendaal also noted that a foot-and-mouth-disease commission had been convened in 2021–22, but its recommendations were never implemented.
The current impasse therefore echoes the findings of the 2022 task team on animal biosecurity, which concluded that SA’s veterinary system was “broken” and characterised by poor co-ordination, inadequate vaccine supply and legislative inertia.
That report, commissioned under the seventh administration, warned that without regulatory reform, contingency planning and public private partnerships, the country would remain unable to respond effectively to major outbreaks. Three years later, the same structural weaknesses identified then — fragmented authority, slow decision-making and reliance on limited imports — are constraining the feasibility of Steenhuisen’s mass vaccination plan.
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