Service Contract financed under the 8th European Development Fund - Project Nr 8ACPTPS 32.

The report covers the period July to December 2003. During this period, two changeswere made in the assignment of TAs to country/region of assignment, notably inTanzania and Cameroon. In Tanzania, Dr Philippe Leppere took over from DrWolfgang Boehle in November 2003, whereas Dr. Hanns-Achim Krebs took over fromDr. John Woodford as TA in the Anglophone West/Central Africa region.The mandate and/or role (s) of the TAs has so far remained unchanged except inTchad which has also seen changes in technical structure. Since October 31st2003,the expert plays the role of PACE coordinator, managing the project in closecollaboration with a National Counterpart (Homologue Veterinaire Tchadien) andunder the auspices of the Directorate for Veterinary Services. He is thereforeresponsible for PACE activities as foreseen by the audit missions held in April and July2003.Over the last six months, both national and regional TAs went on variousmissions/visits in their areas of jurisdiction. Regular visits to the various countries wereespecially important in regional programmes for purposes of activity monitoring andevaluation besides acting as boosters and motivators. Consequently, the TA in chargeof West African Coastal Countries and based in Mali visited each of the sevencountries under his mandate at least once. Togo and Benin have been already visitedtwice. The TA in charge of six West African Sahelian Francophone countries has overthe last six months visited each country at least once. Two countries should haveinitiated a new WP on 01 November 2003. Mali did but Senegal's WP approval wasdelayed until January 31st2004 in order to allow the full de-commitment of unusedfunds.During the reporting period the TAs participated in diverse internationalmeetings/workshops. All the TAs attended the 8thAdvisory Committee Meeting inBamako (November 4 — 6th, 2003), followed by the workshop on the harmonisation ofepidemiology and control strategies, jointly organised by the PEU and GTZ-IS/SATEC(November 7 — 8th, 2003).The main problems experienced during the reporting period are varied. The problem ofinsecurity was particularly common in Northern Uganda, Ivory Coast, DemocraticRepublic of the Congo and Central African Republic. In Kenya the main problemsexperienced were related to delayed 2ndyear funding and conflicting interpretation ofEDF rules (also in Tanzania and Ethiopia), resulting in unpaid year 2 commitments;postponement of applied epidemiology training for field staff; Rinderpest outbreak andlack of project transport. The main setback in Ethiopia and Tanzania was delayedprocurement of equipment. In Ethiopia the tenders for cars, computers and car spareparts failed due to non-competitiveness and non-conformity with the EC rules of theanalysis of the offers. It was necessary to change the tender documents in conformitywith the EDF regulations.Activities planned for the next period are varied. Disease surveillance activities willcontinue with the aim of achieving a rinderpest free status. The TAs plan to assistclosing current WP/CE and prepare new ones or necessary addenda for theremainder of the phase, i.e. till October 31, 2004. Plans include attendance of variousmeetings/workshops relating to aspects of disease control and management issues asbuild-up to the next Annual PACE Conference in Gabon ( June 2004).