The Ekiti government received a donation of 100,000 doses of anthrax vaccines from the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security.
The ministry’s donation was facilitated under the Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support (L-PRES) project.
Ebenezer Boluwade, the Ekiti Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security, received the vaccine doses on Thursday in Ado-Ekiti. He stated that the donation aimed to enhance animal health services.
The commissioner mentioned that the state implementation unit of L-PRES has been raising awareness among stakeholders in the beef/dairy, pig, and sheep/goat value chains about the importance of vaccinating their animals against anthrax disease.
Mr. Boluwade emphasized that anthrax is a severe zoonotic disease that should be prevented before it causes outbreaks. He added that the state plans to conduct a large-scale vaccination program to preemptively tackle the disease.
In his statement, the state L-PRES Project Coordinator (SPC), Olayinka Adedipe, commended the federal ministry for selecting Ekiti as the first state to receive the anthrax vaccines. He assured that the state implementation unit of L-PRES will continue its efforts to raise awareness, conduct sensitization campaigns across the state, and ensure that farmers vaccinate their animals to prevent diseases.
Previously, Abubakar Sodiq, the animal health technical assistant at the Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support (L-PRES) project under FMAFS, highlighted that the allocation of 100,000 doses of anthrax vaccine to the state aimed at disease prevention.
