Dr. John Griffin:

That is a very good point. The example that comes to mind immediately in this regard is New Zealand. It had a very serious problem with TB and it also had a very serious wildlife problem with a creature called the possum. It came in from Australia about a century ago and caused very serious problems with TB in cattle, as well as in the possums themselves. New Zealand then started an eradication programme for possums, by laying poisons and so forth. That country has got to the stage now where it has gone from having hundreds, if not thousands, of herds having been infected to a situation now where there are about 50 herds infected. This has been done over perhaps the last 20 years.

The key thing there is the very high level of co-operation between the farmers and the authority, the equivalent of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. A new board was set up that was led by farmers and stakeholders. I think this had a major impact. Everybody in New Zealand is working together and they have had great success. The country is hoping to have TB eradicated from cattle by 2026 and from the possums by sometime in the 2040s.