26th Conference of the Regional Commission for Africa (Addis Ababa)

Dr Viola Chemis, WOAH Regional Programme Coordinator, presented the results of the GF-TADs for Africa second Standing Group of Experts (SGE) meeting on CBPP in Africa. She provided details on the priority topics of the SGE, the rationale for national and strategic plans, and some lessons learned from Zambia. She emphasized that, strengthening the capacity of National Veterinary Services is essential for effective disease control, requiring investment in workforce training and vaccine delivery solutions. Efforts should be aligned with other priority disease strategies, using cost-effective approaches such as zoning, test and slaughter, surveillance, and combined vaccination.

Dr Hiver Boussini, Head of the Animal Health Unit at AU-IBAR provided participants with an overview of the Animal Welfare Strategy for Africa (AWSA), introduced the African Platform for Animal Welfare (APAW), presented the collaboration between AU-IBAR and WOAH to promote policy alignment, capacity building in Africa and stronger regional integration, and discussed the next steps to strengthen animal welfare in the region. Members were encouraged to:

• Increase the engagement of African stakeholders, including local communities, NGOs and the private sector;
• Consider and work towards a collective effort to address current challenges and implement sustainable solutions;
• Develop strong partnerships between governments, regional bodies, international organisations and stakeholders, as these are essential to achieving a common vision for animal health and welfare.

Dr Charles Bodjo, Director of AU-PANVAC (Pan African Veterinary Vaccine Center of African Union), delivered a presentation on “Increasing the Adoption of Quality Vaccines for Livestock Diseases in Africa”. Among other things, he emphasised that vaccine quality is a critical factor in disease prevention and therefore vaccination should be prioritised. While the quality of vaccines in the region is improving, with clear testing procedures in place, which is encouraging, the need for vaccines’ quality assessment remains a critical issue in the region. Laboratory improvements and assessment also play a key role in ensuring vaccine quality.

Key messages from the presentation were as follows:

• AU-PANVAC is an international independent body that, among other activities, conducts vaccine quality control (QC) tests according to the WOAH “Manual of Diagnostic Tests and Vaccines for Terrestrial Animals” and issues QC certificates.
• Examples of AU-PANVAC’s ongoing activities in veterinary vaccines QC and production were presented: QC of Foot and mouth disease (FMD) vaccine; Genetic stability of PPR vaccine and development of standards for PPR thermotolerant vaccines; Characterisation of RVF vaccines; CBPP vaccine quality.
• AU-PANVAC also supports member countries in vaccine registration. The Recommendations for Harmonisation of Standards for Vaccine Registration in Africa and Auditing of Facilities drafted in Abuja (Nigeria) in July 2023 and endorsed by the 44th Ordinary Session of the Executive Council (AU Summit 2024): Decision EX.CL/Dec.1234(XLIV), were also presented and discussed.

On Day 2 afternoon, the presentations by Mr. Ian Peter Busuulwa, Project Officer – FIRABiOT (WOAH Representation for Eastern Africa) and Dr Francesco Valentini, Programme Officer – PROVNA (WOAH Representation for North Africa), took a deep dive into the projects and WOAH ‘s contribution to emergency preparedness.

WOAH plays a critical role in preparing and fortifying countries against these threats, given that 80% of bioterrorism-related pathogens originate from animals. WOAH’s response to these evolving threats is grounded in five vital areas, two of which were discussed during the presentation:

• Maintaining Scientific Expertise and Setting Standards

– WOAH has developed international standards and guidelines specifically for biosafety and biosecurity, ensuring a scientific foundation for managing health risks.

• Good Governance, Capacity Building, and the One Health Concept

– WOAH supports countries through its Performance of Veterinary Services (PVS) framework, providing capacity-building programs like ZOOSURSY, Laboratory Twinning, FIRABioT, and PROVNA.

– Strategic partnerships with the African Union, INTERPOL, and the Global Partnership Against Weapons of Mass Destruction further strengthen efforts.

FIRABioT Project: Fortifying Resilience Against Biological Threats

One of the key initiatives is the FIRABioT project, launched in 2023 and funded by Global Affairs Canada. The project focuses on building resilience against biological threats in nine African countries, emphasizing national needs-driven workshops, biosafety protocols, diagnostics training, and the development of contingency plans for zoonotic diseases.

PROVNA Project: Eco-regional Surveillance for Vector-Borne Diseases

The PROVNA project aims to define eco-regions in North Africa for enhanced surveillance of vector-borne diseases, such as Rift valley fever (RVF). By integrating satellite data and in-field surveillance, the initiative supports targeted monitoring of disease outbreaks across the region.

WOAH remains committed to strengthening international efforts in biological threat reduction, with a Global Conference on Biological Threat Reduction set for October 2025. The conference will focus on historical experiences, current challenges, and innovative strategies for future threats.

Finally, as the global authority on animal health, WOAH’s all-hazards approach is essential in preparing for and mitigating health security threats. With strong collaboration across its membership and global partners, WOAH continues to drive impactful initiatives that enhance preparedness and response capabilities worldwide.

The PPR session started with a keynote address by Dr. Huyam Salih, the Director AU-IBAR, who presented developments on PPR eradication linking to AU policy, African Animal Health Strategy, the 2025 CAADP Strategy, the 2025 Kampala Declaration, details of the EU funded PPR programme preparatory phase, mentioning the governance aspects to be operationalised through the Pan African PPR Secretariat (PAPS). This was followed by a panel session where she mentioned the other immediate activities as sensitization and awareness of the stakeholders, working with the Regional Economic Communities, enhance advocacy and resource mobilization with push for policy decisions to prioritize PPR eradication at various levels.  

The other panellists were the AU-PANVAC, Dr. Charles Bodjo; WOAH Delegate of Senegal and Council Member, Dr Mbargou Lô; WOAH Delegate Morocco and Vice-President of the WOAH Regional Commission for Africa, Dr. Abderrahman El Abrak; Dr. Felix Njeumi representing the Joint FAO/WOAH PPR Secretariat and Dr. Karim Tounkara the WOAH Regional Representative for Africa. The panel was moderated by Viola Chemis, working with the Regional Activities Department (RAD) of WOAH. 

To ensure quality of vaccines used in country, the AU-PANVAC Director stressed importance of members using only certified vaccines and to utilize their website to confirm certification of vaccine batches. He also encouraged public private partnerships in vaccine production, noting that the existing vaccine producers have capacity to meet the estimated vaccine needs, however, the demand remains unknown. 

The highlights from the Delegate of Morocco about their PPR eradication program showed importance of national resource mobilization, having and implementing a vaccination strategy, supportive legislation for application of control measures such as vaccination involving private veterinarians, provision of free vaccination and compensation for farmers. The weakest point for the programmes remains risk of re-introduction of PPR through livestock movement necessitating a sub-regional approach for PPR eradication. The engagement of private sector veterinarians (and VPPs for Senegal) supported increased coverage.  

The Delegate of Senegal reported they have capacity for vaccine production, and they gave vaccines to neighbouring countries to support implementation of harmonised vaccination plans. Senegal is among the countries implementing the PRAPS project funded by World Bank and able to support vaccination against PPR and CBPP and post-vaccination monitoring. The country is diversifying the tools used for marking vaccinated animals to support traceability and post-vaccination monitoring. However, they are facing difficulties to access kits for sero-monitoring delaying the process.  

The joint FAO/WOAH PPR Secretariat Co-chair (FAO) informed the members to prioritize collection of epidemiological, socio-economic (livestock census, animal movement, watering/grazing points, trade routes) and molecular data. He stressed the importance of traceability system, information about value chain actors, enhance surveillance and submission of PPR sequence data to PPR reference labs to support characterization and understanding of circulating strains to inform delineation of episystems. He also mentioned the support that can be provided by IAEA through the vet-lab network for capacity building and technology transfer. Members were also informed that the secretariat can provide support for advocacy, awareness raising, coordination and partnership, resource mobilisation and capacity building. 

The Regional Representative for Africa, Dr Karim Tounkara, emphasised the support provided through the existing standards on surveillance and vaccination, manuals for diagnosis, endorsement of official control programs, status recognition, self-assessment using PMAT tool, notification and reporting via WAHIS, diagnostic support, capacity building and comprehensive proficiency test using the WOAH PPR reference laboratories and network. He also reminded the audience  of the existing programmes through BMZ OHRT supporting Cameroon and Namibia, the PCTAD project in Eastern Africa and PRAPS in West and Central Africa. 

Dr Rahul Shrivastava, from the WOAH Capacity Building Department (CBD), commented on the Africa Public Private Partnership Forum in the Veterinary Domain and highlighted the main conclusions:

• To improve the governance, management, and implementation of PPPs, it is essential to establish a clear legal and regulatory framework supported by comprehensive guidelines;
• The development of an implementation guide with templates for Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs), agreements, SOPs, and best practices will streamline the development, implementation and evaluation of PPP projects;
• Increased consultation and cooperation between public and private stakeholders are crucial for successful joint programmes;
• A digital networking forum and an advocacy platform should be provided to raise awareness among policy makers, farmers, and other beneficiaries;
• Producers and non-governmental stakeholders can contribute resources and play a leading role in developing and implementing effective programmes in partnership with Veterinary Services;
• In addition, a Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) platform should be established to facilitate knowledge sharing, disseminate best practices, and document lessons learned from existing PPPs.

Dr Abdou Ceesay, Delegate of Gambia, provided participants with details of the rabies situation in his country. He began with some key details about Gambia in general, including details of the dog population. He also provided details on disease reporting, highlighting that rabies has never been reported in wildlife in the country, with only 8 confirmed cases in dogs over a 5 year period (all between 2009 and 2012). Other suspected but not confirmed cases were reported in dogs, donkeys and horses in 2014. He also provided details of human cases reported between 2006 and 2021, with 171 patients with a history of rabies exposure, all of whom were treated with post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP).

With regard to the current situation in the country, the Delegate explained that rabies control is part of the disease prevention and control programme of the Department of Livestock Services (Veterinary Services of Gambia), rabies is a priority zoonotic disease for Gambia and a strategic approach for the control and eventual elimination of rabies was adopted in 2016, the rabies control initiative is fully supported by the Government and partners of the VS. With the exception of the last two years, the government has provided annual funding for rabies vaccines.

Gambia has implemented a year-round rabies control strategy, with annual vaccination campaigns starting on 28 September to coincide with World Rabies Day. The approach includes demand-driven vaccination of owned dogs and trap-and-vaccinate initiatives for strays, although coverage remains low. Public awareness campaigns use mass media, including national television, community radio and symposiums. Dog population control measures, such as neutering, are also in place, particularly for stray dogs. Rabies is a priority zoonosis under the country’s One Health platform, with strong collaboration between NGOs, veterinary organisations and government agencies. Partnerships with the Gambia Tourism Board enable ad hoc rabies control programmes, primarily supported by the Ministry of Tourism.

Collaboration between Mission Rabies UK and the Gambian VS has been initiated to implement a more effective vaccination campaign. With the support of WOAH, the VS have plans to survey the dog population in Gambia.

Dr Jenny Hutchison, Head of the World Animal Health Information and Analysis Department (WAHIAD), delivered a presentation on the latest enhancements of the World Animal Health Information System (WAHIS), and the reporting situation of Members from Africa.

She provided context to the reporting of Foot and mouth disease in Africa to support a panel discussion regarding their use of WAHIS and reporting practices including their use of stable events.

Five panellists (from Côte d’Ivoire, Lesotho, Madagascar, Nigeria, Uganda) participated in the discussion. The following points can be drawn from the exchange between the panellists:

• WAHIS and its official information are important to support Members’ decision-making, particularly in relation to trade. Other sources of information are also used by Members.
• Timely, accurate and complete reporting to WAHIS is essential to maintain its relevance.
• Reporting can be challenging in areas with poor internet, lack of infrastructure and insufficient resources, including trained personnel and laboratory capacity.
• A significant part of the reporting burden is the requirement to report similar data to multiple systems, not just WAHIS.
• WAHIAD is committed to supporting its users and has a dedicated support desk
  (https://wahis-support.woah.org).
• There is a need for WAHIS to accept bulk uploads and downloads of data.
• Members would appreciate a mobile application to receive and view instant alerts.

Ms Jennifer Lasley, Senior Programme Coordinator of WOAH Capacity Building Department (CBD), provided all the conference participants with a training session on how to use PVS data in the PVS Information System (PVS IS) and evidence to defend investment cases for VS and act on PVS recommendations made so that the VS can provide billions of people with access to key services they lack to impact their livelihoods and improve animal health and welfare.

Delegates used PVS data, insights, and dashboards contained in the PVS IS to complete interactive exercises that helped them discover how relevant data can be found, analysed, and presented, as well as how to exploit the PVS IS to develop investment cases and strategic plans for performance maintenance and improvement.

After hands-on experience, Delegates concluded that failure to create attractive investment cases can be a bottleneck for investment in VS, and that evidence-based investment cases are key to meeting infrastructure and service gaps in Veterinary Services to inspire confidence among investors, demonstrate financial viability, and promote accountability and transparency.

The Wildlife Health Framework (WHF) was deployed in 2021 for 5 years after consultation with WOAH Members, to empower veterinary services into wildlife health issues and protect wildlife health using a One Health approach.  

Under the wildlife health framework funded by 6 Members and the EU, collaborations were enhanced, guidelines were produced, data use was emphasised, capacity building was catalysed, and multiple communication tools were produced to respond to Delegates’ needs and expectations collected during the design phase of the programme. 

Delegates were invited to provide input in real-time on the impact of the current WHF and areas of interest for the future WOAH wildlife health program using an interactive presentation tool. These data, combined with feedback from Delegates from other WOAH Regions will inform the next WOAH Wildlife health strategy development.