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The lowering of trade barriers and the intensification of livestock farming
may lead to “devastating” epidemics among farm animals, the UN Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) warned last week. It is worried that livestock
transported between Eastern and Western Europe will spread diseases like foot
and mouth or swine fever. The threat of infection is exacerbated, it says, by
pig farms that keep up to 9000 animals per square kilometre. The FAO is calling
on European countries to overhaul their rules on the movement of animals and
improve farming practices.