Allegations of smuggling anger Meat Board

ALLEGATIONS by a South African entity controlling cross-border movements, Agri Inspec, that sheep and mutton are allegedly being smuggled from Namibia to South Africa have been denied by the Meat Board of Namibia and the Livestock Producers’ Forum (LPF).

‘The Meat Board of Namibia has been confronted by a press release regarding the smuggling of mainly sheep, but also meat and weaners, from Namibia to South Africa,’ said its executive, Paul Strydom. The CEO of Agri Inspec in South Africa, Hennie Kleynhans, last week claimed in an interview published by a South African newspaper that allegedly up to 3 000 to 4 000 sheep were ‘smuggled’ at a time from Namibia. ‘This is not the first time that South Africa’s Agri Inspec has made such unsubstantiated allegations,’ Strydom said on the Meat Board website.’At several occasions during the last year the Meat Board has requested Agri Inspec, its principals and selected recipients of [its] reports to make the information available together with necessary reports in order to identify the so-called smuggling routes or methods, but to no avail.’ Until such a time that Agri Inspec could prove these allegations, ‘the Meat Board denies any smuggling of sheep, meat or weaners from Namibia to South Africa,’ Strydom reacted angrily on Friday.’The Meat Board wholeheartedly supports cross-border trade within the powers of any of the relevant countries’ legislation,’ he added.The LPF said Namibian farmers, especially small-stock producers, were dismayed about these media reports last week.’The LPF is further dismayed that Namibia’s meat industry is linked to alleged malpractices of which the content is only known to Agri Inspec and its principal,’ said Pintile Davids, Chairman of the LPF over the weekend. ‘These alleged malpractices can cause tremendous damage to the trade of animals and animal products between Namibia and South Africa. ‘Under the headline ‘Smuggling in meat damages farmers’ in Die Burger of June 23 and ‘Meat in smuggling net’ in Die Republikein of June 24 serious allegations are made by Kleinhans of Agri Inspec about meat smuggling and we question the allegations,’ Davids said. ‘Neither the Meat Board nor any other producers’ organisation had insight in the report which, according to allegations, was drafted with the financing of an export abattoir. Producers organisation affiliated to the Livestock Producers’ Forum (LPF) already requested at various opportunities that the report be made available so that remedial actions can be taken, if necessary.’The LPF appeals to Government and the Meat Board to take up this matter with their counterparts in South Africa as soon as possible to investigate.’ The allegations by Agri Inspec came at a time when the Namibian Cabinet is expected to decide the future of marketing small livestock, especially to South Africa. A proposal that was already agreed by all parties in February 2009 to impose a N$40 levy per head exported should be applied as an alternative to the current 6:1 export ratio. Six years ago Government implemented a rule that for every live sheep exported, six must be slaughtered locally.Recently the Brukkaros Abattoir in Keetmanshoop rejected this proposal and requested Government for the total closure of Namibia’s border to South Africa for the export of any live sheep to allegedly increase local abattoir throughput. However, farmers complain that some local abattoirs pay much lower prices than those in South Africa.