Browsing: Livestock trade

A bill seeking to provide guidelines to the transboundary movement of livestock as well as control of animal diseases within East Africa is in the offing.  

This comes after East African Legislative Assembly member Dr. Woda Jeremiah Odok introduced the envisaged EAC Livestock Bill 2020. 

If effected, the bill will grant a coordinated identification, characterization, mapping and enumeration of livestock.  It will also strengthen the detection, prevention and control of transboundary animal diseases and provide for a regulatory framework to monitor pastoral ecosystems.  

Livestock sector in EAC 

To understand why this bill is important one must appreciate the bloc’s livestock sector’s potential. East Africa’s livestock sector generates more than US$1 billion annually through the export of live animals and meat to the Middle East and North Africa. 

Livestock is primarily owned by pastoralists in East Africa, who mainly own camels, cattle, sheep, and goats. 

According to a recently …