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Regulation in the Red Meat Chain

By Andrew Shirley from The Gambia

Selling livestock at markets in the UK is getting harder as more and more rules and regulations are introduced.

In The Gambia, there's a striking absence of rules. Cattle bought from all over west Africa to the country's main market are slaughtered and butchered on site for a flat fee of about £5. Lairage is just 20p per animal.

But all animals bought to the market are checked by a state vet for serious diseases after slaughter. If the meat is condemned it's the buyer's problem not the farmer's.

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Cattle in The Gambia tend to be the local Ndama breed, which is tolerant of trypanosomosis - adisease spread by the tsetse fly in sub-Saharan Africa.

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Livestock haulage African style

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Good cattle can be worth hundreds of pounds

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Years of experience

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The butcher's shop

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This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on March 24, 2007 3:39 PM.

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