PC-TAD Project
Project Portal
Read more
The World Organisation for Animal Health – (WOAH), with support from the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) facilitated the national awareness workshop for veterinary paraprofessionals (VPPs) and workforce development held on 3 and 4 August 2022 in Adama, Ethiopia.
The veterinary paraprofessionals (VPPs) workforce development is a key part of the “Prevention and Control of Transboundary Animal Diseases for the benefit of smallholder farmers” (PC-TAD) project, recently launched by the World Organisation for Animal Health in Eastern and Southern Africa, in collaboration with Veterinary Services.
The project entails support to WOAH Member countries to develop their VPP workforce to ensure that VPPs are trained and equipped to provide quality veterinary services to rural smallholder farmers.
Dr Fikru Regassa, State Minister for Livestock and Fisheries, Ministry of Agriculture of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Picture (c) L;Iyadi (woah) 2022.
H.E Dr Fikru Regassa, State Minister for Livestock and Fisheries, and WOAH Delegate, while officially opening the workshop, recognised the importance of the workshop, because Ethiopia is endowed with huge livestock resources that contributes enormously to livelihoods, thus the strengthening of veterinary services could not be over emphasized. The Minister while rallying all stakeholders, encouraged the recruited National Working group on PC-TAD to become the key driver in management of the project implementation whilst collaborating with the National focal point. He urged the participants to implement the project effectively and efficiently to achieve the global plan of eradicating peste des petits ruminants (PPR). He highlighted the Ethiopian government’s efforts towards the control and eradication of peste des petits ruminants (PPR), a disease affecting small ruminants with severe socio-economic impacts on the income of livestock farmers, particularly vulnerable rural communities, notably women who have been adversely impacted over time.
On his part, Dr Samuel Wakhusama, WOAH Sub-Regional Representative for Eastern Africa, highlighted how veterinary services are critical to global and national health security, food security, food safety, agricultural and rural development, poverty alleviation, safe national and international trade, wildlife health and environmental protection and as such they are considered a global public good. He further recognised and applauded the commitment of Ethiopia to support their veterinary paraprofessionals as well as their efforts towards peste des petits ruminants (PPR) control and eradication.
Dr Samuel Wakhusama, WOAH Sub-Regional Representative for Eastern Africa. Picture (c) L;Iyadi (woah) 2022.
Through the PC-TADs programme, the organisation supports its members to identify human resource needs and capacities in terms of competencies and distribution of personnel to deliver veterinary services. WOAH encourages members to assess their veterinary workforce needs and critically address them within the limits of the financial, human, and educational constraints as envisaged in their social contexts.
Some of the VPP stakeholders were invited to deliver presentations on VPP enabling environment in Ethiopia. It was notable from the presentations that Ethiopian Veterinary Association (EVA) in collaboration with the International Livestock Research Institute, have engaged the Ministry of Agriculture in implementing some activities on Public Private Partnerships (PPP) in the veterinary domain.
WOAH technical experts on VPPs workforce development and education who were in attendance, helped to facilitate key sessions that engaged about 50 participants from across all regions in Ethiopia, including members of the national working group who benefited from this comprehensive workshop.
