WORLD FOOD SUMMIT: FIVE YEARS LATER - SIDE EVENT "FAO FIGHTS ANIMAL DISEASES AND PLANT PESTS THROUGH EMPRES"

At the 1996 World Food Summit, the pivotal constraining threat of transboundary animal diseases and plant pests to food security, sustained animal agriculture and trade was recognized. This led the Heads of States and Governments to conclude with a pledge, stated in Commitment No. 3: "Seek to ensure effective prevention and progressive control of plant and animal pests and diseases, including especially those which are of transboundary nature, such as rinderpest, cattle tick, foot-and-mouth disease and desert locust ...".

FAO is considered to have a comparative institutional advantage in coordinating the management of transboundary animal and plant pests and diseases because such management usually requires collaborative actions between countries if success is to be achieved. The EMPRES programme has been developed by two technical services at FAO - the Plant Protection Service (AGPP) for plant pests and the Animal Health Service (AGAH) for animal diseases. Although they share some approaches, they deal with different problems.

EMPRES-Desert Locust

The EMPRES programme on plant pests was initiated in 1994 with a component specifically aimed at the desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria). The desert locust has been a scourge of humanity for at least two millennia. When a plague occurs, crops and pastureland in up to 65 countries in Africa, the Arabian Peninsula and southwest Asia can be threatened. Plagues develop in desert and semi-arid areas where poor subsistence farmers are the first to be affected.

EMPRES-Desert Locust was designed as a long-term collaborative programme among locust-affected countries, donors and FAO. Emphasis is given to strengthening the capacity of national units to carry out preventive control through early warning, early reaction and research. The programme focuses on three regions: western (west and northwest Africa), central (Red Sea area) and eastern (southwest Asia).

Furthermore, EMPRES' experience has enriched FAO's approach to emergencies caused by other species of locust. In Afghanistan, the current locust emergency will lead to a medium-term approach, also covering several other countries in the region, employing a preventive strategy to reduce the risk of future emergencies and using, where possible, biopesticides. Despite these achievements, much remains to be done to ensure that new methodologies and technologies for preventive control function during upsurges and are sustainable.

EMPRES-Livestock

EMPRES-Livestock works through the promotion of four key precepts: early warning, early reaction, coordination and enabling research. With the recent outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in Europe, South America, southern Africa and Asia, of classical swine fever in Europe, and of Rift Valley fever in Eastern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, early warning systems and rapid detection are key to combating disease in an efficient and cost-effective manner. EMPRES, through information networks and collaborative partners, receives and analyses global data and patterns, and disseminates early warning messages to all countries. The actions of countries depend on the level of emergency preparedness to face or limit the entry of a crippling disease into their territory. In this regard, EMPRES has written basic contingency manuals on African swine fever and CBPP and is finalizing manuals on Rift Valley fever and FMD. A disease database management system, TADinfo (transboundary animal disease information system) has been developed to assist countries in animal health management and analysis; the national databases, when shared and linked with neighbouring countries, serve as a regional TADinfo for providing decision support at the regional level. EMPRES has recently launched EMPRES-i (pronounced EMPRES-eye; for information, intelligence, intervention), as a new global early warning information system with informational links for animal diseases, animal health and the environment (see page 15).

Of the 16 major TADs, EMPRES has given primary attention to rinderpest, FMD, CBPP, classical and African swine fevers, peste des petits ruminants, Rift Valley fever and Newcastle disease of poultry.

The major achievements of EMPRES-Livestock include:

• Inititation of the Global Rinderpest Eradication Programme (GREP), an integral part of EMPRES, which has been instrumental in reducing this once devastating disease, responsible for millions of deaths in livestock and wildlife throughout Europe, Asia and Africa, to a few small circumscribed areas of the earth. It is expected that, in the next few years, these last foci will also be eradicated, and a process of declaring freedom from rinderpest, country by country, region by region, will begin.
• Eradication of African swine in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana (2000-2001).
• Eradication of a new FMD virus introduction in North Africa (1999).
• Launching of the Hemispheric Plan for the Control and Eradication of Classical Swine Fever in the Americas, with the objectives of eliminating this disease by the year 2020 and providing a framework for other regions of the world to do the same.
• Participation of over 3.000 animal health professionals and allied technicians in courses and workshops since 1994.

Additional accomplishments of EMPRES-Livestock include:

• Deployment of TADinfo to 40 countries, 12 of which use it fully. An additional eight countries are having their applications processed.
• Assistance in the form of technical expertise, laboratory proficiency or disease control methods has helped numerous countries throughout the world keep African swine fever, FMD, Rift Valley fever and CBPP at bay. Such efforts require solid veterinary and animal production linkages to the field and robust information networks, which, lamentably, are lacking or are deteriorating rapidly in many regions.

Although EMPRES is not a research facility, the analytical activities are of utmost importance for a better understanding of disease patterns and intervention strategies. Furthermore, EMPRES as an entity stimulates, assists and maintains valuable inputs to guide research as needed in the member countries, provides support to reference laboratories for the diagnosis of TADs and collaborates extensively with IAEA and university centres worldwide.

During the World Food Summit: five years later, in June 2002, EMPRES was invited to conduct a special side event opened by the Minister of Agriculture from Namibia and, as a special guest, the Minister of Agriculture from Japan. The event, which was particularly well attended, called for a Global Plan of Action against FMD.

The Declaration of the World Food Summit: five years later focused four of the 35 commitments on TADs and animal health (see box; available at www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/004/Y6948E.htm).