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But having revitalised the town’s pig and sheep market, the business was hit hard by successive disease outbreaks in the livestock industry.
The 14-week closure from August 2000 due to East Anglia’s classical swine fever outbreaks, followed by the world’s worst epidemic of foot-and-mouth disease in February 2001, were a knock-out blow.
When markets could finally re-open in 2002, the cost of compliance with new stringent biosecurity rules was prohibitive for smaller specialist centres.
In that first week of February, more than 100 years of pig and sheep sales at Aylsham came to an end. It joined a long list of lost auction markets across Norfolk.