Private: Policy Support to the African UnionSecuring, Protecting and Improving the Lives, Livelihoods and Rights of Pastoralist Communities

Project Team

AU Policy Framework for Pastoralism in Africa: Securing, Protecting and Improving the Lives, Livelihoods and Rights of Pastoralist Communities

In 2010 we provided technical support to the AU Department for Rural Economy and Agriculture to assist with the development of the first pan-African policy for pastoralism. The policy framework was endorsed at the Conference of African Ministers of Agriculture in October 2010 in Lilongwe, Malawi. A final version of the policy framework is available for download (PDF).

Institutional and Policy Support, AU Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources

From 2000 to 2005 the Center led the Community-based Animal Health and Participatory Epidemiology Project and the Institutional and Policy Support Team in AU/IBAR. This policy support work covered ten main areas:

  • Policy and legislative reform in seven countries in the Horn of Africa to support privatized and veterinary-supervised community-based animal healthcare systems in pastoralist areas
  • Changes to the World Organization for Animal Health (Office international des epizooties) Terrestrial Animal Health Code to recognize community-based workers as a category of paraveterinary worker
  • Testing of pastoralist mini-dairy approaches, with scaling up by the Government of Kenya
  • Support to livelihoods-based approaches to drought response in pastoralist areas
  • Strengthening livestock disease surveillance systems in the Horn of Africa with governments
  • Development and testing of participatory epidemiology with national epidemiology units and veterinary schools, followed by development of postgraduate courses in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Sudan
  • Support to pastoralist livestock marketing by linking pastoral marketing groups to export traders in Ethiopia
  • Co-developing the concept of commodity-based trade in livestock products as an alternative, science-based approach to ensure safe international trade in livestock products
  • Policy analysis including the role livestock development in Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers and economic growth strategies
  • Conflict management in pastoralist ecosystems

Over five years the team in AU/IBAR produced or commissioned more than 120 reports, publications and training materials. The materials focus on policy and institutional change in the Horn of Africa region, but also include Africa-wide and global initiatives associated with CAPE and the IPST. These materials are available on the Policy Support to the African Union website.