ICARDA Caravan, Issue No. 22

Focus

Improving Small Ruminant Health

Aggrey Majok, M. Jabbar, and A. Aw-Hassan

Animal health remains one of the major constraints to livestock production systems in the Near East and North Africa (NENA) region. A new ILRI/ICARDA project, funded by IFAD and conducted in partnership with the national agricultural research systems of Jordan, Sudan, Syria and Tunisia is determining the current limitations posed by poor health services in order to determine what can be done to safeguard farmers’ herds.

etter animal health means increased wealth for livestock owners in the NENA region. But all too often this simple equation becomes complicated as poor farmers with small herds deal with diseases that adversely affect their livestock and, consequently, their livelihoods and development prospects. A lack of effective disease control, poor access to veterinary services, high cost of drugs, and a lack of skills in mounting effective disease surveillance further complicate matters for these farmers. Small-scale farmers are also unable to effectively compete against the more market-oriented medium- to large-scale livestock entrepreneurs, who are able to successfully capitalize on the growing demand for meat and animal products.

ICARDA researchers assess the status of animal health in the Near East and North Africa region.

In January 2004, ICARDA and ILRI (International Livestock Research Institute) started a project that will first assess the current animal health situation in countries in the NENA region and then identify potential solutions to the major problems. The project, called "Small Ruminant Health—Improved Livelihoods and Market Opportunities for Poor Famers in the Near East and North Africa (NENA) Region," specifically aims to contribute to improving livelihoods of poor farmers in the NENA region by increasing productivity and enhancing access to local, national and regional livestock markets through research targeted at improving small ruminant health.

This project is designed to provide action-oriented research results at two levels. At the local level, the emphasis is to better understand the delivery and adoption of animal health and other livestock services to poor farmers, and constraints to local market access by the poor. The overall objective at the national and regional levels is to increase market efficiency and access through research into marketing constraints (policies, reducing transaction costs such as transportation and taxes), and decreasing the threat of market exclusion/disruptions due to the occurrence of small ruminant diseases.

A livestock market and slaughterhouse in Sudan.

In an attempt to achieve these overall objectives, the project researchers first needed to select study sites in Jordan, Sudan, Syria and Tunisia to determine the status of animal health in each country. At a meeting held at ICARDA headquarters in June 2004, the scientists devised a common methodological approach, with a focus on the market chain. They also chose sample sites in Jordan, Sudan, Syria and Tunisia that had a wide variety of production systems (nomadic, semi-sedentary, mixed crop/livestock), market outlets (domestic, export, or a mixture of both), and a significant poverty rate.

The project then began conducting a series of surveys designed to collect information on farm-level constraints to health that affect market access, and its implications; health constraints in the market chain from farm to local consumers; and the organizational structure and regulatory environment of the health delivery system. The capacity building component of the project has already trained 18 staff members (14 in Sudan and 2 each in Jordan and Syria) in Livestock Marketing Assessment; and 10 each in Jordan, Syria, Sudan, and Tunisia have been trained in survey techniques and the principles of disease surveillance. So far, four students are registered with ICARDA for MSC studies.

The project has been focusing on completing all the surveys and gathering all the necessary data before beginning to devise strategies that will support regional, national and local capacity for disease diagnosis, conduct epidemiologic and socioeconomic analysis to assess risk, and develop disease control strategies at sub-national, national, and regional levels.

DrAggrey Majok (a.majok@cgiar.org) is an Epidemiologist and ILRI/ICARDA Project Coordinator based at ICARDA; Dr M. Jabbar is an Agricultural Economist at ILRI; and Dr Aden Aw-Hassan is an Agricultural Economist at ICARDA.

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