Sixth Meeting of the Upper Mekong Working Group on Foot and Mouth Disease Zoning and Animal Movement Management
(OudomXay, Laos, 22-24 January 2007)
This meeting was held in conjunction with activities of the SEAFMD Campaign Project and in collaboration with the OIE Regional Representation for Asia and the Pacific (OIE Asia-Pacific).
The meeting was attended by 31 participants from the Member Countries of the Upper Mekong Group including Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and PR China. Other participants were from ADB, EU (Livestock Farmer Support Project in Luang Prabang), FAO (Regional Office in Bangkok) and OIE (Regional Commission for Asia, the Far East and Oceania, SEAFMD RCU in Bangkok and OIE Regional Representation for Asia and the Pacific in Tokyo).
Dr Boumporne Luttanavoung, Governor of OudomXay, and Dr Bounkhouang Khambounheuang, CVO of Laos, welcomed the participants. Dr Gardner Murray, President of the OIE Regional Commission, and Dr Yoshiyuki Oketani, OIE Deputy Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific, presented the opening speeches.
Dr Ronello Abila, Regional Coordinator of SEAFMD RCU, drew the participants' attention to the outcome of the previous workshops. He reported the progress of FMD control in Southeast Asia, and showed his expectation on the final goal of SEAFMD project as declaration of FMD free zone status in whole Upper Mekong Sub-region by 2020.
Dr Stephane Forman, Technical Advisor of SEAFMD RCU, reported the outcome of the FMD sero-surveillance in the Upper Mekong sub region, and proposed to establish the regional FMD vaccine bank.
Dr Yoshiyuki Oketani presented the recent progress of OIE regional projects to strengthen Veterinary Services and Diagnostic Laboratories of the Member Countries to fight against selected TADs under the umbrella of regional GF-TADs. Against HPAI, OIE Asia-Pacific is implementing high-level laboratory equipments procurement schemes and capacity building programmes. Against FMD, OIE Asia-Pacific will continuously support SEAFMD, especially assist the Animal Movement Management (AMM) workshops to be held in the Upper and Lower Mekong Basin. Against Classical Swine Fever (CSF), OIE Asia-Pacific held a Regional Inception Workshop on CSF control measures in Manila, Philippines, to design future network of Veterinary Services and Laboratory staff members.
Dr Li Huachun, PR China, reported that there were 23 FMD outbreaks in 9 provinces or prefectures from April 2005 to September 2006 in China and that 84.99 million animals (about 95.03% of total FMD susceptible animals) were vaccinated with FMD vaccines in 2006.
Dr Nguyen Ngoc Tien, Vietnam, reported that the number of FMD outbreaks had increased in his country in 2006 and that 11 million doses of FMD vaccine had been distributed to localities, of which over 5 million doses for pigs and 5.5 million doses for cattle/buffaloes.
Dr Than Hla, Myanmar, reported that his country produced 0.125 million doses of FMD vaccine in 2006 for continued outbreaks of FMD.
The participants visited the border zone between Laos and PR China. The participants also visited an animal quarantine office located on the border.