Tanzania was to launch into large scale manufacturing of vaccines to combat animal diseases in October 2021.
The veterinary inoculations planned to start rolling out of the country between October and November, this year, will be exported to other African States and Asia effective from as early as 2022.
Animal Healthcare conglomerate, Hester Biosciences of India, through its Tanzanian subsidiary, the Hester Biosciences Africa Limited, had announced that they intended to start commercial rollout of vaccines from its Kibaha factory in October 2021 onwards
That’s according to an official statement from Hester Headquarters in India.
Africa currently imports about 80 per cent of its animal vaccine requirements. The Tanzanian production by Hester will prove to be beneficial for the entire continent.
The Kibaha plant, located near Dar-Es-salaam, has the initial capacity of rolling out over 2.5 billion doses per year, to supply all countries in Africa, in addition to domestic usage.
The Hester Tanzania plant was established in the Coast Region at the cost of US $18 million.
Hester Biosciences, thus becomes the first Indian company to manufacture animal vaccines in the African region.
The Kibaha facility is set to specialize in the ‘Peste Des Petits’ Ruminants’ (PPR) Vaccines to curb plague infections affecting livestock. The diseases can also be transmitted to wildlife.
PPR, caused by a morbillivirus, is a highly contagious disease of wild and domestic small ruminants such as cattle, sheep and gazelles, species found across Africa, the Middle East, Turkey, West and South Asia, and China.
“We should be rolling out our first commercial vaccine from the Tanzania plant in the month of October. This vaccine is for the PPR and will be sold in the African market,” Rajiv Gandhi, Managing Director, Hester Biosciences was recently quoted from India.
Gandhi added that Hester is the world’s largest producer of PPR vaccines, but producing the inoculations from its India and Nepal facilities.
PPR has caused devastating socio-economic impact and put livelihoods, food security and nutrition of millions of small-scale farmers and pastoralists at risk.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates the annual global impact of PPR between US $1.4 billion and US $2.1 billion.
According to FAO, the global small ruminant count is currently around 2.1 billion, of which nearly 60 percent is found in Asia and nearly 35 percent in Africa.
The organization has set the PPR eradication goal by 2030, to be achieved through interventions such as vaccination.
West Africa based, Vaccine Standards and Pilot Approach to PPR Control in Africa (VSPA), funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is one of the existing programs that aim to support the livestock sector in Africa.
In Hester Biosciences Africa Ltd, Hester has equity share capital of US $4 million, while it has received secured loan and grants commitment worth US $14 million from Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Comments are closed.