For more than seven decades, Pakistan has watched its neighbours establish powerful defenses against one of the most devastating livestock diseases — Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD). India, China, Turkey, and Iran have all built modern FMD vaccine plants capable of producing millions of doses annually. Pakistan, by contrast, has remained a passive observer — content with imported vaccines, short-lived pilot projects, and bureaucratic excuses. This continuing failure by the Federal and Provincial Livestock Departments has become a symbol of institutional incompetence and criminal neglect, costing Pakistan hundreds of billions of rupees every year in livestock losses, trade restrictions, and export failures.

India’s success story began over 40 years ago when the National Dairy Development Board established Indian Immunologicals Ltd in Hyderabad in 1982. Today, the company alone produces more than 360 million trivalent doses annually, fulfilling national needs and enabling exports, with expansion plans to reach 600–800 million doses per year. China, through its Lanzhou Veterinary Research Institute and other state-backed biotech enterprises, has achieved an annual production capacity exceeding 1.5 billion doses, ensuring complete domestic coverage. Turkey’s Şap Institute in Ankara, founded in 1958, maintains a manufacturing capacity of over one million doses per week and successfully produced 4.5 million doses within weeks during the 2023 outbreak. Iran, through the Razi Vaccine and Serum Research Institute established in 1925, launched a modern FMD vaccine line in 2021 with an annual capacity of around 20 million doses, despite sanctions and limited resources.

In shocking contrast, Pakistan has not established a single commercial-scale FMD vaccine plant in over 75 years. Current production is barely 15 million doses per year, while the national requirement exceeds 300 million doses. Even these limited doses depend on imported bulk antigen or low-potency formulations that fail to deliver reliable protection. No national reference laboratory exists for strain monitoring, potency validation, or vaccine matching. The divided responsibilities between the Federal and Provincial Livestock Departments have ensured that accountability remains absent and progress nonexistent.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and independent assessments, Foot and Mouth Disease causes an annual loss of USD 692 million in Pakistan — equivalent to PKR 207 billion. Provincial-level economic analyses, especially from Punjab, suggest actual national losses are far higher — between USD 6–8 billion per year, which means PKR 1.8–2.4 trillion annually. These massive losses arise from reduced milk yield, weight loss, abortions, mortality, lower draught power, and the collapse of export potential. In simple terms, Pakistan’s livestock economy bleeds nearly two trillion rupees every year because successive governments have failed to establish an FMD vaccine plant that every neighbouring country already possesses.

Globally, there are only two strategic options to control and eradicate Foot and Mouth Disease. The first is the stamping-out or culling policy, adopted by the USA, the United Kingdom, and the European Union, which involves the immediate destruction of all infected and exposed livestock with full financial compensation to farmers. This approach, however, requires massive fiscal capacity, insurance systems, and national identification mechanisms — luxuries that Pakistan simply cannot afford. Therefore, the only viable path for Pakistan is mass vaccination — regular, large-scale immunization with potent and strain-matched vaccines.

To control and eventually eradicate FMD, at least 75% of the livestock population must be vaccinated annually. Yet Pakistan barely manages to vaccinate 5% of its national herd. With such an alarmingly low coverage, FMD continues to circulate freely across provinces, crippling productivity and rural incomes while blocking access to international meat and dairy markets. In this situation, one must ask: Can Pakistan ever control and eradicate FMD with only 5% vaccination coverage — even till the Day of Judgment?

A domestic FMD vaccine plant is not a luxury but a national necessity. Local production ensures rapid response during outbreaks, strain matching for local virus types, cost reduction, and complete independence from import delays. It will enable Pakistan to qualify for international disease-free certification, opening global export markets. Veterinary universities and research institutes must be integrated into this national program to build indigenous scientific capacity and innovation in vaccine development.

Pakistan’s livestock bureaucracy has consistently failed to understand that vaccine production is the foundation of livestock biosecurity. It is essential that the government immediately establish a National FMD Vaccine Plant with a minimum capacity of 200–300 million doses annually, supported by a National FMD Reference Laboratory and coordinated through the Ministry of National Food Security and Research. Dedicated budgetary funding and parliamentary oversight are critical to ensure transparency and accountability.

Every neighbouring country — India (1982), Turkey (1958), Iran (1925), and China (1958) — achieved self-sufficiency in FMD vaccine production decades ago. Pakistan, despite being one of the largest livestock-producing nations in Asia, continues to depend on imports and donor-driven pilot projects, while losing PKR 200 billion to 2 trillion every year to a preventable disease. This is not a scientific or technical limitation; it is a policy failure, born of bureaucratic apathy and political neglect.

The time for excuses has long passed. Pakistan must act now — establish its own FMD vaccine plant, empower its scientific institutions, and protect its livestock economy. Until that happens, every outbreak, every diseased herd, and every rupee lost will remain a silent indictment of Pakistan’s policymakers — who chose complacency over competence, and politics over progress.

Dr. Alamdar Hussain Malik
Advisor, Veterinary Sciences, University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Swat
Former Secretary / Registrar, Pakistan Veterinary Medical Council
Former Financial Advisor, Finance Division, Government of Pakistan