A total ban on the movement of livestock has been imposed in Nakasongola District after authorities confirmed the death of 55 cows due to the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD).
The indefinite restriction announced on Tuesday now expands to the entire district, compared to the earlier one, which only targeted Wibinyonyi Sub-county issued on September 2, 2026.
Making the pronouncement on behalf of the District Security Committee and Veterinary Department, Mr Festus Bandeeba, the Nakasongola Resident District Commissioner, disclosed that the decision follows the confirmation of FMD in the district, which has so far claimed 55 cows and affected 1,300 animals in Wabinyonyi, Kakooge, Nakitoma, Nabiswera and Lwampanga sub-counties.
‘The livestock movement ban cuts across all Sub-counties in Nakasongola. Because the District is a transit route for livestock from other districts, the security teams are under instruction not to allow any trucks unloading or loading livestock through the major transit routes.” Mr Bandeeba said on Tuesday.
Adding: ”Both the farmers and traders are cautioned against flouting the current quarantine guidelines.’
Mr Rogers Kulaba Ssemanda, the Nakasongola LC5 Chairperson, said the animal quarantine will hit hard as families are expected to sell their animals to take their children back to school.
‘It is unfortunate that the FMD has struck at a time when several of the parents who derive their respective livelihood from the livestock industry are taking their children to school.” He regretted.
Noting that: ”The District security team and the other stakeholders are already aware of the inconvenience and challenges that come with the quarantine. We have no other option outside the quarantine.’
Like several of the other cattle corridor Districts that have had repeated FMD outbreaks, Nakasongola District is prone to FMD outbreaks that have remained a big challenge to the livestock farmers.
On January 27, 2025, the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) lifted a year -long livestock quarantine that had been slapped on Nakasongola District after the outbreak of FMD in January 2024.
The new livestock quarantine slapped on Nakasongola, according to a section of the livestock farmers, is worrying.
Mr Stephen Misanga Kato, a livestock farmer in Nabiswera Subcounty, says that while individual farmers are embracing the mass vaccination campaign against the FMD disease, government agencies are failing to check the livestock in transit through the cattle corridor regions.
‘We may not effectively fight the FMD disease in Nakasongola District if we fail to check the animals in transit through Nakasongola. Our efforts as individual farmers to embrace the FMD vaccination campaign should not be paralysed by the ineffectiveness of particular guidelines meant to check the livestock in transit,’ he told the Monitor on September 15, 2026.
In February 2024, the Minister of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, Mr Frank Tumwebaze, told Parliament that his Ministry needed Shs671bn to acquire vaccines for an estimated 44 million animals to be vaccinated twice in a year to check the FMD disease.
Cabinet approved Shs10bn for the purchase of FMD vaccines targeting the FMD high-risk areas in the Country.