Based on the existing plan and provided that cooperation with livestock farmers continues, ‘very soon we will be able to say that we have successfully tackled foot-and-mouth disease’, President Nikos Christodoulides said on Sunday, stressing at the same time that the Government ‘will stand by livestock farmers until the very end’.
Speaking to journalists after a memorial service in Palaichori, and asked whether he would meet protesting livestock farmers, the President said that he remains in contact with all organised livestock farmers’ groups and all agricultural organisations.
He further noted that he sees ‘a willingness from everyone to cooperate even more closely in order to address this particular challenge’, expressing hope that this cooperation spirit would continue. He also voiced confidence that, based on the existing planning, ‘if this cooperation continues, very soon we will be able to say that we have successfully dealt with foot-and-mouth disease’.
Referring to the Government’s approach towards livestock farmers, President Christodoulides stressed that ‘we have stood by them from the very first moment’.
‘You have also seen our recent decisions. If you compare them with similar decisions at European level, the decisions taken by our Government are clearly far more enhanced, and I am referring to financial support; I would not call it compensation,’ he underlined.
‘And I am pleased because we are able to do this due to our responsible fiscal policy, but it is also an indication of how strongly we believe in our country’s primary sector,’ he added.
Noting that Cyprus is an island and ‘a remote country’, he said, that it was ‘of utmost necessity that the primary sector is supported and strengthened’, assuring livestock farmers that ‘we will stand by them until the very end, until we revitalise this important sector of our economy’.