VISION, STRATEGY and PARTNER COLLABORATION - Collaboration on Avian and Human Influenza in Sub-Saharan Africa - Achievements
AU-BIRA Action Plan to combat avian influenza in Africa
At the 5th meeting of the Executive Committee of ALive (Nairobi, October 2005), the AU-BIRA Action Plan against Avian Influenza was presented and discussed by the Executive Committee members.
The revised version emerging from this discussion, which was officially validated at the 7th Conference of African Ministers of Animal Resources (Kigali, November 3-4, 2005), served as the basis for a request, submitted to the International Donor Conference on avian flu prevention efforts (Beijing, January 17-18, 2006), for an African funding allocation.
Preparation of the Beijing Conference (January 2006)
In anticipation of this conference in Beijing, ALive organized a videoconference (January 12, 2006) for donors represented on its Executive Committee(i.e., AfDB, USAID, EU, AFD, MAE and IBRD), in order to work out a joint position for Africa, to be presented in Beijing, regarding the advisability of using already existing and functional mechanisms (e.g., PACE and ALive’s Multi-Donor Trust Fund). ALive also held two videoconferences concerning Nigeria in order to encourage collaboration among ALive’s various technical and financial partners operating in Nigeria.
Proposed terms of reference for rapid assessment of country capacities
ALive has produced draft terms of reference for rapid assessment of the ability of countries to prevent and combat avian influenza and prepare for a possible pandemic.These terms of reference constitute a solid basis for the preparation of Integrated Action Plans.For further information about Rapid Evaluation, click on Resources.
The draft TORs were submitted for validation at the 6th meeting of the Executive Committee, and are available on-line under Products.
Summary of national and regional interventions and collaboration among the various stakeholders (April 2006)
The 6th Meeting of the Executive Committee of ALive (Bamako, April 24-25, 2006), which focused primarily on avian influenza, produced a preliminary summary of national and regional interventions to date, and enhanced collaboration among stakeholders in the policy arena, as well as in technical and financial terms.
As a result, the ALive Executive Committee decided to:
- Include an avian influenza component in ALive’s annual activity program for 2006-2007;
- Temporarily assign to this component two members of ALive’s Executive Committee to be responsible specifically for the human health (WHO?) and communications (UNICEF?) subcomponents;
- Develop, under this component, a joint action plan for national, subregional and regional intervention that integrates: policy dimensions (i.e., the determination of joint strategies, thereby avoiding the proliferation of uncoordinated initiatives); technical aspects (i.e., establishment of a common intervention process such as the Rapid Assessment -> Integrated Action Plan -> Financing Plan sequence); and multisectoral aspects (i.e., communication, animal and human health), which will also need to be harmonized with other initiatives in progress (and particularly those of PACE and GF-TADs);
- Exploit the various existing funding sources on the basis of comparative advantage: e.g., ALive’s MDTF and the Global MDTF for Avian Influenza;
A decision was made in particular to put forth a joint and shared position in Vienna, in order to ensure vigorous mobilization for Africa on the part of donors and the international community.
Preparation and adoption of a joint position on Africa at the Vienna Conference (June 2006)
A Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM) took place in Vienna on June 6 and 7, 2006, with the primary goal of monitoring progress made at the worldwide level in terms of mounting a collective response to avian and human influenza prevention and control.
Compared to the previous Conference (Beijing, January 2006), more emphasis was placed this time on Africa.The remarks delivered by Dr. Traoré, speaking on behalf of all stakeholders involved in Africa under the aegis of ALive, were very well received and the Director of IBAR made a particular point of complimenting the Secretariat on the quality of the materials accompanying his presentation.
Two points essential for Africa emerged from this conference, namely: (i) additional resources are needed to cover all the needs of the continent; and (ii) there is a proposal to hold the next SOM on African soil.
It is important to emphasize here the usefulness and excellent performance of the ALive platform, which made it possible to organize the Conference jointly and to draw up a consensus-based and harmonized presentation of needs and interventions to be carried out in .
