From the early 1980s to 2000, there was a very efficient Farm Veterinary Service in Malta. I know, because, from 1985 to 1994, I was one of those vets. KPH, the Milk Producers’ Co-op, funded the vets’ salaries. That worked well at the time and, as we shall see, is the only kind of Farm Vet Service (FVS) that can possibly work here. I left Malta in 1994 because, six months previously, the vet who had been working with me left to take up another position, leaving me as the sole service provider. Obviously, that doubled my workload and made life difficult. With farmers paying no visit fees, we vets were called out for every little thing, sometimes just to deliver medicines. KPH advertised for a replacement for my departed colleague. They interviewed and agreed terms with a Hungarian vet, who, delighted with his chance to get away from the grimness of recently post-communist Hungary, had returned home and begun his preparations for his family’s departure to sunny Malta. My Hungarian colleague stuck it out for six years but decided, in 2000, not to return from his annual home leave. He’d had enough. Now, suddenly faced with having no vet, the committee of KPH decided to dispense...