1. Policy issues have recently started to attract attention as a component cause of the poor performance of the livestock sector in Africa. In a conference on livestock policy issues organized by ILCA in 1984, we were able to observe that the most often repeated problems for poor policy formulation and implementation were the lack of reliable statistics, shortage of funds and of manpower. Several studies carried out during the last 10 years or so (please see the reference list for some of these) have shown that, among other things, the availability of domestic recurrent finance and the composition of expenditure therein have continually bedevilled African governments' ability to provide effective agricultural and livestock services.
2. Middle-level1 policy-makers directly associated with the management of livestock services most often hold the view that the availability of finance is the most critical financial variable but one over which they have little or no control. While it is largely true that other parts of central government (particularly the Central Treasury or Ministry of Finance) control the availability of finance, it could be arguable that there are no other variables which such policy-makers can influence. One that has been pointed out by Sandford (1983) is the ratio between expenditure on the staff and non-staff items of livestock services. He states that "this [financial variable] is something over which the managers of livestock services do have some control". From observations of existing budgetary practices in many African countries - a priori staff and non-staff allocations and very restricted transfers between the two budget items even this does not seem to reflect the prevailing reality at large.
1
"Middle-level" is merely meant to indicate the relative position of directors of veterinary services or others in a similar position compared to policy-makers at a higher level - e.g. permanent secretaries, ministers - not to downgrade their seniority.
3. The manipulation of the ratios between staff and non-staff items of expenditure, wherever possible, is something that can be done within a given government budget. Thus such action is likely to have not only a short-run effect (based on annual recurrent budgets) but manipulation can only be done within the absolute limits imposed by the budget (i.e. the level of funding) which directors of veterinary/livestock services (henceforth DVS) feel they are powerless to affect. There are other variables which are not subject to such budgetary limitations and will also have longer term effects on the adequate funding of livestock services. These include the policy options related to free versus charged services, and public versus private services. The barriers preventing DVS from influencing such policy decisions in the short-term tend to be more political in nature. Middle-level policy-makers may feel they possess little or no leverage over such political issues.
4. This perceived inability to have some direct and significant say on financial decisions (both internal and external to the budgeting process), could have deterred DVS from taking the initiative to search for alternative and less direct ways of influencing the policy-making process. I contend that DVS can and should find ways to influence policy, despite their limited direct leverage on the critical policy variables themselves, if they look hard enough into the factors which determine these variables.
5. The definition of the term "policy" has been extensively discussed by Sandford (1985)2 and I therefore do not intend to go into that again. What I need to point out is that this paper is concerned mainly with the policy-making process but also to some degree with policy analysis and implementation. We need to determine the role of African directors of veterinary or livestock services (those whom I designated earlier as middle-level policy-makers) in this process.
2
A policy [is] a set of decisions which are oriented towards a long-term purpose or to a particular problem.
6. In most African countries, authority to decide on public expenditure, financing, and related policy is highly concentrated at the level of the central finance and planning organs of government. In light of this, it may appear unrealistic and futile to single out and discuss the "distinct" role of middle-level policy-makers in such a process. On the other hand, it is a historical fact that in several countries of sub-Saharan Africa, most of the present government policy regarding livestock services derives from the relatively strong role played by DVS (e.g. livestock disease control policy in Botswana and other parts of southern Africa). Despite the less overt role that they may presently play, I believe that DVS can be instrumental in the transition from the provision of services largely monopolized by government to the relatively "radical" proposals being put forward to reform the financing and delivery system for livestock services. This reform needs political commitment (de Haan and Nissen, 1985) at the highest levels of government and DVS are better placed to cultivate this commitment if they are prepared to take the challenge.
