Tag Archives: DFID

Animal Production / Books and chapters / Consumption / Food security / Health (human) / Livelihoods / PA / Pro-Poor Livestock / Research / Zoonotic Diseases

New FAO book spells out rationale, priorities for investing in livestock development to reduce poverty

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A new FAO study reports that more than 85 per cent of poor livestock keepers in sub-Saharan Africa live in extreme poverty; here, at a Toureg encampment near Fakara, in Niger, a boy herds a prized animal, and asset, of his family (photo credit: ILRI/Stevie Mann). A new book on the intersection of poverty reduction … Continue reading »

Animal Diseases / Wildlife / ILRI / PA / Emerging Diseases / HIV-AIDS / Geodata / Epidemiology / Zoonotic Diseases / Agri-Health / Project / Report / CRP4

The ecology of disease: NYT cites ILRI study in report on rising threat of wildlife diseases transmitted to people

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Illustration by Olaf Hajek, in The New York Times Sunday Review: ‘The Ecology of disease’, 14 Jul 2012. Jim Robbins in The New York Times Sunday Review today writes about the ways breakdowns in the world’s ecosystems can ‘come back to haunt us in ways we  know little about. . . . Multimedia Graphic Hot … Continue reading »

Agri-Health / Animal Diseases / CRP4 / East Africa / Emerging Diseases / Epidemiology / Ethiopia / ILRI / India / MarketOpps / Nigeria / PA / Report / South Asia / USA / West Africa / Zoonotic Diseases

Human-animal diseases are emerging in the North, have biggest costs in the South–New ILRI study

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Zoonotic emerging infectious disease events (non-wild hosts). Published In report to DFID by Delia Grace et al.:  Mapping of Poverty and Likely Zoonoses Hotspots, ILRI, 2012 (map credit: ILRI/Delia Grace). Natasha Gilbert reports today in Nature on the ‘Cost of human-animal disease greatest for world’s poor’, noting that ‘the United States and western Europe are … Continue reading »

Agri-Health / Animal Diseases / Emerging Diseases / Health (human) / Zoonotic Diseases

Combating zoonoses in emergent livestock systems – Meta-database of potential approaches

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Zoonoses pose an increasing problem globally due to increasing world human population, intensifying livestock production and ongoing encroachment of people into formerly sheltered natural ecosystems and greater contact with wildlife. Technical solutions alone are not enough to respond to this increasing challenge. Understanding the social, cultural, economic and governance issues around zoonoses in different regions, … Continue reading »

Drought / Drylands / East Africa / Ethiopia / Film and video / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / PA / Pastoralism / PLE / Vulnerability

CNN publishes major story and video about livestock insurance project helping herders in northern Kenya

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ILRI is working with insurance companies to train livestock herders in Kenya’s northern drylands in the benefits and costs of a new index-based livestock insurance first made available in Marsabit District in 2010 (photo credit: ILRI/Andrew Mude). CNN has published a major story on a major breakthrough—a project that is insuring never-before-insured livestock herders in … Continue reading »

CRP11 / Drought / Drylands / East Africa / Film and video / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / PA / Pastoralism / PLE / PovertyGender / Vulnerability

Livestock insurance for the Horn: Looking back in anger, forward in hope–CNN video

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A new CNN video—Protecting farmers against drought—describes the benefits of ILRI’s Index-Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI) scheme in Kenya’s Marsabit District, runtime: 5:44, 11 Jun 2012 (CNN Marketplace Africa). Watch the video     Read the transcript Some half a year after the drought that devastated large parts of the Horn of Africa broke towards the end … Continue reading »

Food security / East Africa / ICT / Livestock / Seeds / Farming Systems / Geodata / Epidemiology / Uganda / Canada / Event report / Poultry / CRP4

New consortium to investigate environmental changes spreading diseases between animals and people in Africa

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Malawi crop-and-livestock farmer (photo credit: ILRI/Susan MacMillan). One of the drivers of disease in Africa, a continent with a particularly heavy disease burden, are environmental changes that help to spread infectious pathogens between animals (both wild and domestic) and people. That is why the start of a new research program, in which the International Livestock … Continue reading »

Drought / Drylands / East Africa / Insurance / Kenya / PA / Pastoralism / PLE / Vulnerability

Kenyan herders cope with drought by buying livestock insurance

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Sake Dabasso Halake stands proudly in front of Equity Bank’s Marsabit branch. She smiles, clutching an envelope filled with 16,000 Kenyan shillings that she just received. It was her insurance payout for the 10 cows she lost during the drought. Photo on Flickr by Jeff Haskins. Jeff Haskins, director of the Nairobi office of Burness … Continue reading »

Animal Production / Farming Systems / Livestock / Livestock Systems / Pastoralism / Policy

Policies for pastoralists?

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Pastoralists across the world suffer serious problems of poverty, vulnerability to shocks and political marginality. Authored by WrenMedia, this series of Information Notes from the Natural Resources Institute outlines the major challenges to development of and for pastoralists. Opportunities for Development Challenges to Pastoral Development Rights, Governance and Voice Risk Reduction and Linking Relief with … Continue reading »

Pastoralism / Food security / East Africa / ILRI / PA / PLE / Drought / Geodata / Kenya / Insurance / Vulnerability / Event

Unusual project cushions drought impacts on poor livestock herders in drought-ravaged Horn

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Some people in Kenya’s Marsabit District who in recent months lost up to a third of their cattle and other livestock to a great drought in the Horn of Africa received insurance payments last week; this man awaits his payout following a village meeting in Dirib Gombo, where it began to rain just two weeks … Continue reading »