The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security has provided Ekiti State with 100,000 doses of anthrax vaccines, as part of the Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support (L-PRES) project.
Ebenezer Boluwade, the Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security in Ekiti, received the vaccines in Ado-Ekiti on Thursday, emphasizing their importance in bolstering animal health services.
Boluwade noted the efforts of the state implementation unit of L-PRES in educating stakeholders in the beef/dairy, pig, and sheep/goat value chains about the necessity of anthrax vaccination for animals.
Anthrax, a severe zoonotic disease, requires proactive prevention measures, according to Boluwade, who announced plans for a comprehensive vaccination campaign to avert outbreaks.
Olayinka Adedipe, the state L-PRES Project Coordinator, commended the federal ministry for selecting Ekiti as the initial recipient of the anthrax vaccines.
Adedipe said the state implementation unit of L-PRES would continue to create awareness, carry out sensitisation campaigns in all the nooks and crannies of the state, and ensure that farmers vaccinate their animals to prevent diseases.
Earlier, the animal health technical assistant, Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support (L-PRES) project at FMAFS, Abubakar Sodiq, said that the allocation of 100,000 doses of the anthrax vaccine to the state was to prevent the disease.