Both national Veterinary Services and international standard-setting organisations have now embraced risk assessment as an essential tool for achieving their goals. Veterinarians have key roles in all aspects of the control of food-borne hazards of animal origin, but additional specialist skills are necessary for assessing, managing and communicating risk. Further, the deployment of Veterinary ...

I n today’s world of veterinary medicine, veterinary clients expect that their animals will receive high standards of specialized care (1). In companion animal medicine, clients often treat their pet as “one of the family” and expect that veterinarians also make the animal’s health a priority in comparison to revenue generated from the animal’s care (2). Companion animal owners consider their p...

It is an unfortunate fact that not only has veterinary education failed to adapt in the face of likely future needs, but it has also failed to respond to societal changes that have already taken place and that have affected the requirements for veterinary services and veterinary capability. The responsibility is primarily that of educators, although vision and foresight require a co-ordinated a...

This paper discusses the information needs of urban and peri-urban livestock keepers and the various information sources used and their effectiveness in disseminating livestock information. Mixed method approach was the methodology used in the study whereby quantitative data was gathered using questionnaires while qualitative data was gathered using in-depth interviews and participant observati...

About thirty years ago the financial, logistic and manpower resources of veterinary and animal production services in the developing world were stretched to the limit. Epizootic disease control was their main and often only field activity, which left livestock owners to manage their daily production and health problems alone. To meet their requirements, Veterinary Services in these countries ca...

We carried out a study to determine ethno-veterinary knowledge used to treat and prevent livestock diseases in Toteng Village in Ngamiland District, northwestern Botswana. Primary data were collected through simple random sampling of 45 households in Toteng. Respondents were either livestock owners or cattle herders. Respondents were interviewed using a structured questionnaire which had both o...