Veterinary Services use of the Global Burden of Animal Diseases to prioritise interventions, monitor impact and develop critical competencies

Attracting and sustaining investment in Veterinary Services and animal health programmes from national government budgets, development aid and grants, and philanthropic donors requires economic rationale using relevant, reliable and validated analytical approaches. The complex interwoven relationships between animal health, livestock husbandry systems, national food security, global health security, and environmental sustainability emphasise the importance of improving data governance and stewardship and applying economic analysis to understand animal disease burdens. This should enable prioritised investment of limited resources and effective monitoring of the impact of programmes overtime. Data governance and stewardship capacities are fundamental to development, implementation and performance monitoring of evidence-based policies in animal health. There are challenges in data availability for national and sub-national livestock populations in different sectors, for disease incidence and prevalence, and animal health expenditure in support of optimised allocation of scarce resources, be they finance, land, labour, or management attention and policy focus. Animal health data systems governance and stewardship and economic analysis are core skills for Veterinary Services developing and applying evidence-based policy, but capability probably varies amongst World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) Members. The WOAH Performance of Veterinary Services programme has several critical competencies that are relevant to economics of animal health and to data governance and stewardship, but these have not yet been targeted for coordinated capacity development. Implementation of public private partnership approaches for animal health programmes creates increasing expectations of robust data and methods for prioritisation, options analysis, and assessing impacts and costs. Experience and examples from national systems in New Zealand, Australia, Ethiopia and Indonesia illustrate current challenges associated with prioritisation of animal health programmes using economic analysis. The Global Burden of Animal Diseases programme intends to support WOAH Members and partners to develop capacities for and standardise approaches to economic analysis and prioritisation in animal health programmes.