Saving Malawi’s flood-hit livestock   

The Lilongwe Society for the Protection and Care of Animals (LSPCA) and the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security have conducted a large scale programme to administer livestock drugs in three flood-hit districts of southern Malawi. Heavy rains in early 2015 contributed to numerous animal health problems, including pneumonia, lumpy skin disease, and foot rot, caused by water-logged soil. “The type of drugs that were delivered by LSPCA were in line with those diseases that we expected to emerge after the flooding situation, such as bacterial and protozoan," said Taurayi Mlewa, chief animal health and livestock officer.

Charles Mkoka

Satellite project tackles illegal fishing

In early 2015, Palau participated in the launch of Project Eyes on the Seas, a satellite technology-based system to monitor, detect, and respond to suspected illegal fishing activity. Within 24 hours of the launch, a suspected illegal fishing vessel, which had been monitored since December 2014, was apprehended through a process coordinated under the new system. 

Weather text alerts   

Over 1,000 Ugandan fishermen are receiving free SMS alerts to help them decide when and where to fish in Lake Victoria. Severe weather across the lake causes up to 5,000 fishermen deaths each year. The provision of text-based information is being facilitated by a partnership project between the World Meteorological Organisation and national meteorology departments in the Lake Victoria region. On a broader scale, the project aims to increase the livelihood security of both farmers and fishermen in the region, by strengthening climate observation, modelling and forecasting, and improving the sharing of information with local people.

James Karuga