STRENGTHENING THE CAPACITY FOR ESTABLISHING EFFECTIVE AND RESILIENT ONE HEALTH AQUATIC ANIMAL HEALTH AND BIOSECURITY CONTROL SYSTEMS IN AFRICA

There have been mounting concerns from Africa’s aquaculture stakeholders on the status and access to aquatic animal health and welfare, biosecurity and biosafety control and environmental management services with consequent negative impacts for sustainable market-led aquaculture development, notably reduced productivity, food-safety, access to markets, public health and aquatic biodiversity. Cognizant of the sectors concerns, the African Union Commission (AUC), in consideration of the continent’s Policy Framework and Reform Strategy for Fisheries and Aquaculture in Africa (PFRS), African Union’s (AU) ten year action plans for Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries and Aquaculture, Animal Health Strategy for Africa, Animal Welfare Strategy for Africa, AU Framework for Antimicrobial Resistance Control, AU Policy Framework on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards, the Africa Blue Economy Strategy (ABES) and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCTA) in 2023, commissioned the AU Interafrican Bureau of Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) to lead, plan, and coordinate all activities related to aquatic animal health in Africa, and to strengthen continental and regional policy and governance to promote aquatic biosecurity control and improve access to markets for aquatic animal products in lieu of its continental mandate.  AU-IBAR was thus tasked to undertake the following in collaboration with its sister agency, the AU Pan-African Veterinary Vaccine Center (AU-PANVAC) in accordance with Africa’s Fisheries Reform Mechanism (AFRM):

1. a continental assessment of the status of transboundary aquatic animal diseases and aquatic antimicrobial resistance on the continent to facilitate evidence-based decision making for their control
2. review Africa’s continental water and aquatic environmental management guidelines with the view to strengthening and promoting sustainable fisheries and aquaculture management, aquatic biodiversity conservation and aquatic ecosystem health
3. develop a continental Aquatic Animal Biosecurity Strategy and Aquatic Animal Vaccine Strategy

The AFRM emphasizes an all-inclusive participatory process in the formulation and implementation of all continental fishery and aquaculture development actions.  This session at AFRAQ24, marks the first continental public multi-stakeholder consultation to seek the views, share experiences and obtain contributions from the sector’s practitioners for the above-mentioned proposed actions.

Key words: African Union, aquatic, animal, diseases, health, welfare, biosecurity, biosafety, biodiversity, vaccines, One Health, ecosystem, environment, market access, food-safety, antimicrobial resistance, public health, laboratories, standards, trade, strategy