OPEN FOR BUSINESS
Pledging that Britain is "open for business", Brown promised a campaign to promote rural tourism and said he had ordered a study into boosting the rural economy.
A severe outbreak of foot and mouth disease in 2001 forced the slaughter of six million animals and inflicted billions of dollars of losses on farmers and the tourism industry as much of the countryside was closed to visitors.
British officials said earlier on Friday they were investigating the possibility that the disease had jumped to a farm in a new area, outside the surveillance zone, fuelling fears the disease could spread.
However, a vet who inspected calves at the farm was "absolutely sure" they did not have foot and mouth, farmer Laurence Matthews said.
The BBC reported initial tests found no foot and mouth, but experts were waiting for a second batch of results.
Britain's chief veterinary officer Debby Reynolds said an interim report on the outbreak found it was very likely the source of the infection was the Pirbright research centre, close to the farm where cattle were first infected, she said.
The site houses two foot and mouth laboratories -- one public and one, Merial, owned by U.S. firm Merck and French firm Sanofi-Aventis SA.
It remains unclear how the virus could have escaped from the laboratories, which say they have strict hygiene measures.
Reynolds said Britain had made preparations to vaccinate livestock as part of a contingency plan to halt the spread of foot and mouth disease, but had not ordered vaccination yet.
Foot and mouth spreads easily on the wind and causes animals to foam at the mouth and collapse.
