It looks like the disaster is over at last - and now the only way is up,

says an optimistic ROB SIMPSON, spokesman for the Yorkshire and North East NFU

MUCH of my time last week was spent dealing with the anniversary of foot-and-mouth disease.

As you can imagine, it wasn't something we were exactly celebrating. But the media was using the event to re-visit some of the issues of last year's nightmare, and it was also an opportunity to highlight the first glimmers of optimism in the livestock sector.

The first cattle market re-opened in North Yorkshire last week - albeit under stringent biosecurity procedures - and farmers are hoping that restrictions, which have been causing massive disruption to the industry, will continue to be lifted over the coming months.

Around 500 farmers in North Yorkshire had their livestock slaughtered as a result of disease controls, and some have now started to re-stock.

For those farmers who suffered the agony of watching their animals destroyed, there will be nothing more satisfying than the sounds and smells of livestock back on the farm.

As one farmer explained: "When the vets and Ministry people had gone after the cull, all we were left with for months afterwards was a deserted farmyard and an unnatural silence."

The fact that those same farmers are now re-stocking is testament to the courage and resilience of the farming industry.

Indeed, a survey recently released by DEFRA (formerly the Ministry of Agriculture) suggests that as many as 94 per of farmers whose livestock was culled will continue farming.

Another reason to be optimistic arrived earlier this month when the UK was recognised as clear of the disease by not only the European, but also the world authorities. And domestic restrictions on livestock movements were also reduced this month.

After the catastrophic 2001, the coming year can only be better.

It has been a year of unparalleled suffering in the farming community but also of unparalleled courage and spirit. We are looking forward to a very different spring from the appalling one we went through last year.

But there remain areas of concern.

Foot-and-mouth arrived after a four-year long recession in the agricultural sector which cost the industry more than 60,000 jobs, and when farmers could ill afford the £900 million which they lost to the disease.

And despite some promises of improvements in commodity prices in the year ahead, economists remain guarded about saying we are finally out of the recession.

Many of the economic conditions which have damaged farmers' finances since the late 90s are still around today - the strength of the pound against the weak euro continues to be a critical factor in the profitability of UK farms, just as it is for the whole manufacturing sector. It continues to depress agricultural prices in this country, acting as a cap on prices.

Millions of UK cattle and sheep were slaughtered due to disease controls last year which will lead to shortages of British meat this year. But rather than lead to any proper price recovery, that situation is likely to lead to an increase in meat imports into this country.

Despite this, we must also ensure that we see foot-and-mouth disease through to the very end. There is a need for continued caution through the lambing period. Once this hurdle has been cleared, farmers will expect that the last remaining controls in place are reviewed and removed as soon as possible.

Our goal now is to stop this from ever happening again by ensuring that the country's controls to prevent illegal imports are brought up to scratch. It is a travesty that, one year on, the situation has not markedly improved.

Every lesson that needs to be learned about how to prevent and fight such awful diseases in the future must be engraved into the minds of the industry and Government.

The anniversary of the first foot-and-mouth case allowed us to compare last year's disaster to the desires for the year ahead.

But we must learn from last year and work towards a more profitable future.

Updated: 10:54 Tuesday, February 26, 2002