There’ve been cases of foot and mouth disease in Germany, Hungary and Romania this spring. How would we fare if it crossed the Channel? We’re talking about biosecurity all this week, how to prevent disease, like FMD, from getting into the country and how to stop it spreading if it does. Livestock farmers have to follow strict rules when they move their animals. They also have to record all movements to ensure each individual cow or sheep can be traced in the event of an outbreak of a contagious disease. Cattle passports were introduced in 1998 after the BSE crisis and since 2010 all sheep have to be electronically tagged, a response to the major foot and mouth outbreak in 2001. We visit a south Cumbrian auction to hear about biosecurity measures and to see what farmers make of them. And James Wood, Professor of veterinary epidemiology at Cambridge University, tells us that in order to prevent the spread of disease, biosecurity measures are just part of the story.

A group of cross party MPs has told the Government that farmers are way down the pecking order compared to the big supermarkets and food processors, and often feel powerless to challenge questionable behaviour by them. Yesterday in Parliament Alistair Carmichael, Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland and also Chair of the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee, introduced what’s called a ten minute rule bill; the ‘Food Supply Chain Fairness Bill’ aims to give farmers a more level playing field.

Presented by Caz Graham and produced by Beatrice Fenton.