Chairperson, hon Deputy Minister and hon members, the ANC in the province of the Eastern Cape unconditionally supports this monumental piece of legislation which seeks to resolve disparities between meat safety standards for urban and more affluent areas with expensive abattoirs, on the one hand, and those for rural and poor communities in which such facilities do not exist, on the other hand.
The current Act, the Abattoir Hygiene Act of 1992, has a rigid and selective approach which makes access to service difficult for the majority and impossible for the rural communities of South Africa.
The Bill wants to do away with considerations of cost as a determining factor in obtaining safe meat, cost which was used as a tool to compromise poorer communities in their health and wellbeing because they could not afford to pay for these services.
The injustice of the past made us ignorant with regard to meat inspection, more especially in rural areas.
Babesakuthi abantu basezilalini xa kuxhelwe inkomo okanye igusha bakuthabathe oko ngathi baqinisekile ukuba loo nyama ayinazintsholongwane, bayitye. Kodwa eyona nto yayiba ngumnqa kukuba babesakuthi xa inkomo okanye igusha ithe yazifela, indlela ababeyivavanya ngayo ukuba ilungele ukutyiwa yayikukuba bathabathe igaqa lenyama baliphosele inja. Ibiya kuthi ke ukuba loo nja ithe ayafa baqiniseke ukuba inyama leyo ingatyiwa. Kodwa ke ukuba ithe inja leyo yafa, babesazi ukuba basengozini. (Translation of Xhosa paragraph follows.)
[In the rural villages, when a cow or sheep was slaughtered, it used to be assumed that its hygienic status was good, that is, it was safe for people to eat the meat. But what is amazing is that if that animal's cause of death was unknown, to ensure that it was safe for human consumption, a piece would be thrown to a dog. If the dog did not drop dead, people would be sure that it was safe for them to eat the meat. But if the dog died, they would know that to eat the meat would be a risk and, therefore, pose danger to their lives.]
This Bill addresses the imbalance of expensive abattoirs by shifting the focus to the safety of the end product, rather than costly structures which are only accessible to deeper pockets. All consumers, urban and rural, rich and poor, will benefit in view of the fact that meat for consumption could affect human and animal health. One of the measures introduced by this Bill, which is welcomed by our rural communities, is that an opportunity will exist for abattoirs to be set up as small businesses, and will be able to provide a more user-friendly system. Most of the big abattoirs are in metropolitan areas, which results in a serious shortage of proper slaughtering facilities in rural areas.
Undoubtedly, this accommodates the needs of our diverse society and stimulates a collective commitment to establish a culture of hygiene and meat safety awareness, as the Bill is trying to establish a meat safety concept rather than just abattoir hygiene, as is currently the case.
One of the important principles proposed in the Bill is the provision for the assignment to agencies and nongovernmental organisations of meat inspection services. The advantage of using agencies outside Government is that the state will be able to perform its statutory functions by harnessing capacity in the meat industry for the implementation of legislation, without having to expand the public services, and it will also help to prevent the utilisation of scarce resources within the state to deliver services that can be delivered just as efficiently by nongovernmental organisations.
Due to the lack of formally qualified persons and the fact that meat inspectors are not available throughout the country, especially in rural areas, this Bill makes provision for duly qualified and authorised persons to perform functions in terms of this Bill.
This could be utilised as an opportunity to train persons with the necessary potential to perform such functions, especially in areas with shortages of qualified persons. [Applause.]