The Global Rinderpest Eradication Programme (GREP) Technical Consultation and EMPRES Expert Consultation held in Rome in September/October 1998 reviewed the progress made in rinderpest eradication and endorsed the view of the GREP Secretariat that a more vigorous approach is required if global freedom is to be attained by the year 2010. Experts unanimously endorsed the need for an Intensified GREP to complement the existing activities and focus on clarifying any remaining areas of uncertainty and elimination of the last remaining foci of persisting infection in the shortest possible time.

GREP commenced throughout the world in the 1980s with mass immunisation campaigns which extended control to a point where, as described below, the remaining foci of endemicity are few, distinct and isolated.

The internationally agreed procedure to verify eradication (the OIE Pathway) commences with the cessation of rinderpest vaccination once a country is satisfied that it has experienced no clinical rinderpest disease for two years. Many countries that were affected in the 1980s no longer experience rinderpest and have either ceased, or intend to cease, vaccination and have entered on the OIE Pathway or are expected to do so in the near future.

For example, for Africa, the Pan-African Rinderpest Campaign (PARC) strategy is for all countries to declare provisional freedom from rinderpest for either the whole country or for zones of countries in which foci of infection persist. Similarly for Asia, all countries east of Pakistan are being advised to cease vaccination and embark on the OIE Pathway, as Indian and Bhutan have already done, and several countries in the Near East are similarly ceasing vaccination.

As a result most of the world's cattle and buffalo population will soon become completely susceptible to rinderpest. This period of increasing vulnerability is unavoidable if global eradication is to be achieved and the transition period to final eradication requires careful management.

Accordingly, the EMPRES Expert Consultation of October 1998 advised that the then continuing presence of a number of rinderpest foci in parts of Africa, West and South Asia could not be regarded simply as matters of national or local concern. Such foci posed a grave risk to the world cattle population and their prompt and assured elimination called for a concerted international action involving national governments, the donor community, non-governmental organisations and the international community.

Accordingly GREP mounted an intensified programme to resolve rinderpest persistence in the six areas where the virus was suspected to be present. In this GREP was greatly assisted by FAO's Technical Cooperation programme and financial assistance from the European Union. This yielded rapid results leading to the situation today where only one reservoir remains.

• OIE: Guideline development, rinderpest Ad Hoc Group meeting participation
• AU-IBAR: Co-charing and implementing the Somali Ecosystem Rinderpest Coordination Unit project
• Partnership for the implementation of the Somali Animal Health Service Project phase 2 (SAHSP II)
• NGOs: Veterinaire Sans Frontiere Belgium, Terra Nuova, UNA, COOPI and VSF-Germany.