Ian Dacre

Background

About Ian Dacre

On starting at FAO in 2019 my focus was on supporting the ECTAD teams numerous projects principally focused around the serious issue of avian influenza in Asia. Then a week later China declared its first case of African Swine Fever. In the months that followed we have watched this fatal disease (of pigs) spread throughout China, and into Mongolia, Viet Nam, Cambodia and Laos. My new role takes me back to my core experiences of emergency management, and I shall be looking to see where we may use emergency management practice for animals used in natural disasters to help mitigate impact of animal disease emergencies such as the current African Swine Fever pandemic. I graduated from Massey University in 1991 and after five years in general veterinary practice in Scotland, left to work for the equine charity SPANA. This was based in Morocco but also involved work in Mali, Tunisia, Jordan, Syria, Kosovo and Albania. In Morocco I was the Technical Director responsible for running 10 centres with around 40 local veterinarians, hospitalising over equines and having over out-patients per year. After five years in Morocco, I returned to Scotland to complete a PhD in equine dentistry at Edinburgh University. After 14 years abroad I returned to New Zealand to work for the Ministry of Agriculture and Massey University. WSPA then approached me to help them establish their ‘Global Disaster Management Network’ as Disaster Management Operations Director (DMOD) for the Asia-Pacific region based in Bangkok, Thailand. In 2014 I broadened my role within WSPA, re-branded as 'World Animal Protection', taking on the task of being the region's Senior Veterinary Adviser, however a new opportunity to work with the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) in 2015 coordinating a recently released programme under NZ MFAT funding looking at how 'Foot and Mouth' disease may be controlled in South East Asia. And so now to FAO from 2018.after 18 months I find myself again in animal health emergency management. We all know risk-reduction activities have a much better ROI than Response.yet response will always get the headlines. I am grateful to FAO and related donors for giving us the opportunity to show this.