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The British Poultry Council (BPC) Antibiotic Stewardship play a critical role in delivering good bird health and welfare, safeguarding the efficacy of antibiotics and help to produce food that is trusted by consumers. The recently published 2020 BPC report has shown reduced use of antibiotics in the last few years. 

 The ReWaterMENA project, a multi-partner, four-year initiative that started in 2018 aims to expand the safe reuse of water in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The project is funded by the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) and led by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI). The project is regional in scope and has specific activities in Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon. In Jordan, activities are conducted in partnership with the Royal Scientific Society.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) also known as the silent pandemic, is a serious global health threat and low- and middle-income countries are likely to be the most affected in terms of economic burden and public health. Deaths from drug resistant infections are projected to increase from 700,000 to 10 million annually. Antibiotics have found their way into wastewater and recently more studies have highlighted the role of wastewater as a significant environmental reservoir of AMR. This environment is conducive for the global spread of multi-resistant bacteria and other microorganisms and for antimicrobial resistant genes to persist. Wastewater treatment processes can assist in removing or reducing the antimicrobial resistant bacterial load.  However, the impact on the resistant genes is limited as they are not degradable and therefore are able to spread amongst other microbial communities in the environment through gene transfer, a process by which bacteria transfer resistant genes. In addition, another growing area of concern is the uptake of these antibiotics by crops irrigated by treated wastewater.

One of the key strategic objectives of the World Health Organisation’s global antimicrobial resistance (AMR) action plan is to improve public awareness and understanding of this issue. Very few AMR awareness campaigns have targeted the animal production sector, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where rural communities can be geographically difficult to access via traditional face-to-face community engagement methods. Aquaculture is a major food production industry in Bangladesh and across Asia, an area which poses a significant risk to global AMR dissemination. A pilot study sought to investigate the potential for digital communication materials to rapidly and effectively communicate AMR messages to rural aquaculture farmers in Bangladesh.

In Ethiopia, improved access to veterinary drugs has led to their increasing use in food-producing animals. The animal health extension service that ought to educate and advise community members about integrated animal health management strategies is limited. Community members, including livestock keepers, have limited access to animal health education, advisory and training services. Livestock keepers often buy veterinary drugs from roadside markets and self-treat their animals without considering the consequences of administering these drugs themselves. Most of these small-scale farmers have limited knowledge of the link between misuse of veterinary drugs and the emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which results in treatment failures in animals and humans. To address this knowledge and information gap, the CGIAR Research Program on Livestock in Ethiopia tested a community-based animal health extension approach using ‘community conversations’ to engage community members and local service providers in collaborative learning and joint action processes to increase AMR awareness.