1. Efficient and reliable animal health services constitute an essential prerequisite to livestock development in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). First, losses due to livestock mortality in SSA are approaching US$ 2 billion per year, and losses due to decreased growth, fertility and work output as a result of disease are thought to be about as high (Annex 1). Second, diseases deter many SSA small-holder farmers from upgrading their stock to higher productive genotypes or even from keeping livestock altogether. Third, the prevalence of disease vectors such as the tsetse fly and ticks precludes the adequate use of approximately 10 million square kilometers of land in SSA by livestock. Fourth, the prevalence of certain diseases causes the lucrative EEC export markets - which offer preferential prices for developing countries - to remain closed to many countries of SSA.
2. However, over the last decades, the quality of the animal health services has deteriorated. The rapid expansion of public sector veterinary staff - the dominant supplier of veterinary services - at the expense of funding for means of support and operating costs, forced drastic cutbacks in field operations, and staff became office-bound and their morale plummeted. Several studies (Anteneh, 1983, 1985: Leonard, 1984; de Haan and Nissen, 1985) documented this decline. At the same time, the traditional leaders, who earlier imposed on their herders' groups the discipline of sanitary control and vaccination, lost authority under new post-independence administrative arrangements and a power vacuum developed at field level.
3. On the other hand, the demand for veterinary services has increased sharply. First, traditional herders have become more aware of the benefits of veterinary care, especially since the Rinderpest outbreaks of the early 1980s, and are willing to pay for effective and reliable veterinary services. Second, livestock ownership has become more diversified, as crop farmers, government officials, and traders see livestock as one of the more profitable investment opportunities. These new livestock owners recognize the importance of disease control in reducing the risk to their investment in livestock. However, they have no experience in livestock raising and therefore depend much more on outside assistance for veterinary care than traditional pastoralists do. Third, in the past decade close to 20 million cattle have moved into the humid disease-infested savannahs from the less disease-prone semi arid rangelands, and thus the demand for veterinary services in the higher rainfall areas of SSA has increased dramatically. Fourth, livestock prices have kept ahead of the cost of the main drugs used and therefore have made veterinary care more affordable. This can stimulate further intensification of production, with more valuable cross-bred livestock pushing up the demand for veterinary services and justifying the higher expenditures involved.
4. Faced with dwindling resources and a growing demand, public authorities and donor agencies began looking for alternative ways of organizing and financing animal health care. Thus, during the early eighties an active dialogue developed between the heads of SSA livestock services and representatives of donor agencies (Bujumbura, 1984; Blantyre, 1984; Berlin, 1986). Subsequently, several projects with alternative forms of animal health services were initiated, amounting to approximately US$ 500 million in foreign commitments over the period 1985-1989.
5. Donor support has been mainly provided by (i) the European Development Fund (EDF), largely through its funding of the OAU/IBAR-sponsored Pan African Rinderpest Campaign (PARC), which linked support for Rinderpest vaccinations to the implementation of policy reforms to make the vaccination campaigns self-sustaining and to alleviate some of the more serious distortions in the sector: (ii) Technical Cooperation Service of the Federal Republic of Germany (GTZ), which focused on the development of basic animal health care systems at the grass-roots level; (iii) Aid and Cooperation Fund of France (FAC), also through the financing of basic animal health care systems and through the provision of technical assistance to a number of national projects, financed by multilateral donor institutions; and (iv) the World Bank, which over the last five years has devoted an increased share (up to 40 percent) of livestock funding to improving animal health, combining structural reforms in the privatization of animal health services and retrenchment of government services, with investment activities. Further important support has been provided by the Overseas Development Association of the United Kingdom (ODA), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the African Development Bank (ADB).
6. This paper outlines the types of reforms introduced in animal health services over the past decade, summarizes past experiences, provides a preliminary assessment of their impact, and indicates what lessons need to be taken into account in future policy adjustments and project investments. The discussion concentrates on World Bank-supported initiatives, because of the easier accessibility of the data to the authors.
