A path shared for 27 years - IFAD

The Joint Programme provided grant funds for a number of initiatives
that were not explicitly contemplated by its mandate but that were
recognized as important.
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One grant allowed IFAD to initiate prompt response following the
detection, in Libya, of the New World Screwworm, whose larvae feed
on the flesh and brains of warm-blooded creatures including humans,
birds and animals. This pest was immediately recognized as a serious
threat to the fauna, livestock and humans throughout sub-Saharan
Africa, where veterinary and health services were weak or non-existent,
and also throughout the Mediterranean and the Middle East. It had
been eradicated in the United States and Mexico using a “sterile insect
technique“ combined with intensive surveillance, animal treatment and
animal movement control. Libya was, however, under an embargo that
would normally have banned access to the technology. Aware of the
risk that the pest could take advantage of cross-Saharan trading routes
to spread southwards, IFAD petitioned the United States Congress
to allow laboratories in the United States to produce sterilized males
for shipment to Libya. A grant for almost €790,000 from the Joint
Programme got things started immediately and other donors came on
board. The first shipments of sterilized male flies were made late in 1990,
scarcely a year after the flies were first detected. By end-1991, infestation
rates had dropped to safe levels. According to a manual published by the
World Organization for Animal Health in 2008, attempts to eradicate the
pest had been successful.
The first shipments of sterilized male
flies of the New World Screwworm to
Libya were made late in 1990, scarcely
a year after the flies were first detected.
By end-1991, infestation rates had
dropped to safe levels.
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Mother and child with a goat, (north-western) Somalia.
Their lives would have been at risk had the New World
Screwworm not been eradicated in Libya in 1989-91.
©The Joint Programme