LONDON A British government minister on Saturday said vaccination could be used in future to protect farm animals against foot-and-mouth disease, a solution ruled out by the government during last year's devastating outbreak.

"I don't doubt that vaccination will have a stronger role as part of a contingency plan," Animal Health Minister Elliot Morley said, adding those problems arising from the use of vaccination could be resolved.

Many farmers have argued that vaccination would make it impossible for them to export meat to disease-free countries, as it Leave disease antibodies in the animals' bloodstream that makes it impossible to distinguish infected animals from vaccinated ones, AFP reported.

The National Farmers' Union has also opposed vaccination, claiming it would slow down exports of British meat exports.

But Morley said the time between vaccination and authorization for export could be reduced from a year to six months, which would be a "great improvement".

"You have seen some changes already in terms of international rules and EU rules, that makes vaccination much more of an option than it has been in the past.

"I don't doubt that it will have a greater use in the future, particularly as technology improves and also as we get some of the trade rules, which prevent the use of vaccination, changed," he said.

Morley's comments follow a story in ***The Times**** newspaper Saturday which said that two reports on the 2001 outbreak, to be published in July, will urge the government to scrap its slaughter policy if the disease returns.

Instead, they will propose that healthy animals be vaccinated to prevent the disease spreading.

According to the newspaper, Environment and Rural Affairs Secretary Margaret Beckett is expected to approve the proposal.

Last year's outbreak led to the slaughter of six million animals across the country, costing the agricultural industry more than 900 million pounds (1.4 billion euros).

The country's tourism industry also took a battering as a result, resulting in loss of 4.25 billion pounds (6.8 billion euros).

Britain was only declared free of the disease, which affects livestock but not humans, in January this year.

Separately, British veterinary authorities said on Friday that they may have spotted the first signs of a new disease affecting pigs, known as Aujeszky's disease, at the same slaughterhouse where the first cases of foot-and-mouth disease were found in February 2001. The suspected case was at the Cheadle meats abattoir in the eastern English county of Essex.

Aujeszky's disease, also known as pseudorabies, is neither as devastating or as contagious as foot-and-mouth and mostly strikes pigs with respiratory and reproductive problems.