FAO at the anniversary of its Russian veterinary reference centre

For the 65th anniversary of the Federal Centre for Animal Health (ARRIAH) foundation

A Veterinary Medicine in Food Security and Biological Safety anniversary scientific and practical conference dedicated to the 65th anniversary of the Federal Centre for Animal Health (ARRIAH) foundation took place at the Veles club-hotel, 300 km east of Moscow, in the Vladimir Region, over two days (7–8 December).

Considering the successfully developing cooperation between FAO and ARRIAH, the Moscow office of the Organization was invited to the conference as a guest of honour, and its Director Oleg Kobiakov moderated the opening ceremony and plenary meetings of the first conference day.

“65 years is a celebration not only for your Centre, but also for many of your partners, because you have been cooperating with FAO and the World Organisation for Animal Health for a long time.

The fruits of this work are visible,” said Sergey Dankvert, Head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance, at the opening of the forum.

Turning next to his childhood memories, Sergey Dankvert talked about how he and his father, who was a state farm chairman, used to inspect farms at the height of the foot-and-mouth epizootic outbreak, visit farms, and pass through sanitary checkpoints. He also remembered the invasion of locusts devouring whatever was green and a long wait for the An-2 “kukuruznik” agricultural aircraft, which finally sprayed acaricides.

“When I started my journey as the head of Rosselkhoznadzor, I understood perfectly well that our development is, first and foremost, the development and prosperity of the domestic agricultural industry. We have achieved considerable success,” Sergey Dankvert continued. “While we used to import 3.5 million tonnes of meat, last year we imported only 530 thousand tonnes and at the same time exported about 700 thousand tonnes of different types of meat along with livestock.

As we can see, our agricultural industry not only meets the domestic market’s demand for products but also exports them. It has been developing and improving its performance year after year. Today we are self-sufficient in meat.

The Federal Centre for Animal Health, as an integral part of the agricultural industry, is a vivid example of the results and successes we have achieved. Despite the difficulties we face, the Centre continues to grow and develop.”

Minister of Agriculture of the Vladimir Region Oleg Pugaev noted the Centre’s successes in Russia and abroad, and wished it good luck, further development, significant results in ensuring the biological safety of the country, and success in the international arena. “Having such a centre in the Vladimir Region is not only prestigious but is also a great responsibility,” Oleg Pugaev emphasized. “ARRIAH is the flagship of science, and we have gathered here today not just at an anniversary celebration but at a scientific and practical conference.”

The capacity of ARRIAH regarding scientific developments is huge, ARRIAH Director Roman Rybin noted. He paid special attention to the openness of the Centre and the ability to engage in constructive and mutually beneficial dialogue with foreign colleagues and partners. He cited successful cooperation with Taiwan as an example, which, thanks to the developments of ARRIAH, was able to obtain the status of a territory free from foot-and-mouth in 2017.

Director of the All-Russian Plant Quarantine Centre (FGBI “VNIIKR”), academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Evgeniy Nazin noted the joint work with ARRIAH under the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance.

On the first day of the forum, representatives of distributors and veterinary departments of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Egypt, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, as well as employees of the All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Veterinary Medicine and the Russian Poultry Union, spoke about the fruitful partnership with the Vladimir Centre.

“Animal health plays an extremely important role for FAO, thus, the cooperation with ARRIAH, the leading Russian scientific centre in the field of veterinary virology, microbiology, epizootiology and molecular biology is rather significant for the Organization,” Oleg Kobiakov, Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the Russian Federation, highlighted in his FAO’s Contribution to Tackling Hunger presentation.

“In a number of countries of the world the growing demand for animal products is met mostly thanks to the development of large-scale production and the related food chains,” the head of the FAO Moscow office continued. “At the same time, livestock production ensures livelihoods of hundreds of millions of small producers and pastoralists. Farm animals are not only used for food production, but also perform other important economic, cultural, and social functions. They are an important part of agroecosystems.

The FAO’s objective in this area is to increase the contribution of the livestock sector to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by facilitating the transformation of both small- and large-scale livestock systems that will make them economically, socially and environmentally sustainable.”

According to Oleg Kobiakov, “60% of all human infections are zoonotic diseases, and around 75% are due to cross-species jumping of pathogens. Diseases with serious consequences affect critical animal products, which account for 33% of protein and 17% of calories in the human diet and impact the availability and quality of terrestrial animal food products.

According to various estimates, the livestock sector is directly and indirectly responsible for 14.5 to 20% of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere. At the same time, some livestock systems are among the most vulnerable to climate change (especially in arid zones) and the spread of new environmental diseases.

These are large-scale problems,” concluded Oleg Kobiakov, “but the livestock sector has an enormous potential for improvement, provided that there are opportunities ensured for greater meaningful sharing of best practices within a given system and region.”

In his Contribution of ARRIAH to Exercising the International Powers of Rosselkhoznadzor presentation, Vasily Lavrovsky, Advisor to the Head of Rosselkhoznadzor, listed the numerous barriers and hindrances that Russia had needed to overcome on its path towards sustainable and dynamic development of the agricultural sector.

“By the time the reforms started, the country’s leadership and the agricultural agency had had no illusions about the leading role of the ‘magic hand of the market’ and formed a clear position on the need for state support for the most important agricultural branches and regulation of foreign trade in food,” Vasily Lavrovsky stated.

Afterwards, the understanding of unfavourable foreign policy conditions led to the adoption of the Law on the Development of Agriculture of the Russian Federation (2007) where the state had declared its “direct responsibility for ensuring food security by targeted financing of the leading sectors of the agricultural economy, primarily livestock production” for the first time.

“One of the reasons why the world’s leading food exporters persisted in involving Russia in the World Trade Organization (WTO), promising it free access to the global food markets,” Vasily Lavrovsky continued, “were the ostensibly excessive requirements of the national veterinary legislation during import, which annoyed them, despite the undeniable competitive advantages of developed countries allowing them to subsidize exports and offer dumping prices on the notorious ‘Bush legs’.

In the midst of negotiations about joining the WTO, Russia was heavily dependent on imported food supplies. ‘Business decided everything’, and governmental mechanisms for supporting agriculture were launched with great difficulty.”

“Thus, the power to use sanitary and phytosanitary protection measures (in accordance with the rules of the WTO ‘green’ and ‘amber’ boxes) made Rosselkhoznadzor the main agency regulating the circulation of food in the market with a strictly scientific justification of its requirements for importers.” The speaker highlighted the leading role of ARRIAH in programmes for the inspection of foreign veterinary services.

In conclusion, the Rosselkhoznadzor expert said that the institution had become the main base and industry flagship in the development and application of electronic information systems that made it possible to combine and systematize a large amount of data on the origin and movement of any regulated livestock products in the country.

Director of the Veterinary Department of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation Maria Novikova noted ARRIAH’s difficult historical path and its well-deserved international authority and acclaim, and finished her speech with the reassuring conclusion: “If ARRIAH does not do it, no one will!”

BACKGROUND

ARRIAH is the FAO reference centre for foot-and-mouth disease and zoonotic coronaviruses.