Fisheries and livestock Minister Mohammad Aminur Rashid very recently said that the government would not allow the import of sacrificial animals from neighbouring countries or abroad like previous years as the country has an adequate supply of cattle for the upcoming Eid-ul-Azha. Besides, the minister said that import of cattle fattening injection or any steroid is completely disallowed. But a section of unscrupulous cattle traders might collect those medicines for fattening the sacrificial animals. The department of Livestock Services (DLS) will destroy those illegal drugs by conducting drives across the country, the minister added.
Forewarned is forearmed, so goes the maxim. With barely nineteen days left for Eid-ul-Azha, we think it will be wise to alert people beforehand about the quality of the sacrificial animals that remain open to question. Many head of fattened cattle had died in the past and a lot of people reportedly fell ill eating the meat of the fattened sacrificial cattle.
The problem began to show up since when the cattle, instead of being domestic animals, were converted to farm products for commercial use. Cattle, particularly bullocks, are seldom seen in rural farmland to plough the field because of the growing use of agricultural tools like tractors and power-tillers. Now the farmers find livestock rearing a lucrative and well-remunerative job.
Cattle rearing gives the farmers and traders a good dividend and a section of greedy traders in their lust of making mint divert their energy to fatten the cattle overnight. The profit-motive propels them to push lethal hormonal drugs into the bodies of sacrificial animals. And in doing so, they ignore the fatal effect of cattle fattening on public health. The offenders have become so desperate that they now use any deadly drugs to fatten the cattle by skipping the alert.
In developed countries scientific rules and regulations are stringently followed in cattle fattening. Strict punitive measures are taken against any use of harmful chemical or overuse of any legal drug in any commercial livestock farm is a grave offence punishable by laws. But in our country a section of dishonest traders fattens up cattle by pushing steroid hormone jabs in deadly dose with impunity. Consumption of such poisonous beef or mutton can breed fatal diseases like heart and kidney damage and cancer as well.
We think this dangerous process of cattle fattening must be altogether banned and our farmers should be encouraged to abide by the old but safe process of cattle fattening. Our farmers know full well how much oilcake is to be mixed with straw and what kind of grass is to be given as feed to their cattle to make them gain weight. Our farmers know from experience that well-proportioned mix of grass and straw with liquid treacle can add to the flesh and fat of the cattle.
The livestock officials should start a campaign to train the farmers about the natural and scientific method of keeping their cattle healthy and weighty. The authorities concerned also must launch vigorous monitoring across the country to ensure drug-free sacrificial animals during the Eid.
