As from 2001, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) has embarked on a course to deepen regional integration through restructuring. Under the new structure SADC has centralised the coordination of its activities to the Secretariat in Gaborone. The former Sector Coordinating Units have been merged into four directorates, one of which is the Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources (FANR) Directorate, which comprises, amongst others, the Livestock Development Unit (LDU). The LDU, under the aegis of the FANR, formulates policies for regional livestock development in order to respond to the objectives of the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP), and which are mainly to: • Contribute to improved food security. • Promote wealth creation. • Enhance rural livelihood. • Enhance livestock as a tradable and consumable commodity. Following the launch of the SADC Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) negotiations, the eight SADC EPA member states identified sanitary and phytosanitary and technical barriers to trade to be major trade barriers for access to international markets, especially the EU market where standards are normally set beyond international standards. SADC has already brought some of the issues related to beef exports to the OIE Regional Commission for Africa as SADC member states feel that a few of the present requirements do not have a scientific basis. The paper discusses the process that the LDU follows in the formulation of policies and strategies in regional livestock development with the objective of bolstering intra and extra regional trade in livestock and livestock products.

The Mkuze Game Reserve (MGR), in north-eastern KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa is an African swine fever virus (ASF) controlled area. In a survey conducted in 1978, ASF prevalence in warthogs and Ornithodoros ticks in MGR was determined to be 2 % and 0.06 %, respectively. These values, acknowledged as being unusually low compared to other East and southern African ASF-positive sylvatic-cycle host populations, have not been assessed since. The availability of a sensitive PCR-based virus detection method, developed specifically for the sylvatic tampan host, prompted a re-evaluation of ASF virus (ASFV) prevalence in MGR ticks. Of the 98 warthog burrows inspected for Ornithodoros presence, 59 (60.2 %>) were found to contain tampans and tick sampling was significantly male-biased. Whilst gender sampling-bias is not unusual, the 27 °% increase in infestation rate of warthog burrows since the 1978 survey is noteworthy as it anticipates a concomitant increase in ASFV prevalence, particularly in light of the high proportion (75 %>) of adult ticks sampled. However, despite DNA integrity being confirmed by internal control amplification of the host 16S gene, PCR screening failed to detect ASFV. These results suggest that ASFV has either disappeared from MGR or if present, is localized, occurring at exceptionally low levels. Further extensive surveys are required to establish the ASFV status of sylvatic hosts in this controlled area.

The effect of Bu-Zhong-Yi-Qi-Tan (BZYQT) on the changes of ultraviolet (UV) light B radiation-induced apoptotic sunburn cell (SBC) and epidermal ATPase-positive dendritic cell (DC) in SKH1-hr or ICR mouse were investigated. The mice were treated with UVB (200 mj/㎠) and were sacrificed 24 h later. BZYQT (50 mg/kg of body weight) or vehicle (saline) was given i.p. at 36 and 12 h before irradiation, and 30 min after irradiation or BZYQT cream (0.2%) or cream base (vehicle) was topically treated at 24 h and 15 min before irradiation, and immediately after irradiation. The skin of SKH1-hr mouse prepared from the back of untreated mice exhibited about 0.3 SBC/cm length of epidermis, and 24 h after UV irradiation, the applied areas show an increased number of SBCs. But the frequency of UVB-induced SBC formation was reduced by intraperitoneal injection of BZYQT extract (p less than 0.01). The numbers of DC in normal ICR mouse were 628.00 ± 51.56 or 663.20 ± 62.58 per ㎟ of ear epidermis. By 1 day after UVB treatment, the number of ATPase-positive cells/㎟ were decreased by 39.0% or 27.1% in i.p. or topical application group with vehicle. Treatment of BZYQT was associated with increase of 33.9% in i.p. group (p less than 0.05) or 2.7% in topical application group in the number of ATPase positive cells compared with the irradiation control group. The results presented herein that BZYQT administration could reduce the extent of skin damages produced by UVB.

The zebra shark Stegostoma fasciatum which had been reared in the commercial aquaria was found dead and submitted for postmortem examination. A pure bacterial culture was isolated from pale and enlarged liver. The analysis of ureC and 16S rRNA genes confirmed the isolate as Photobacterium (P.) damselae subsp. damselae and this pathogen was sensitive to gentamicin. Although, no mortality in mouse was observed in the experimental infection study, the isolation of this pathogen in aquarium fish is significant because it can act as a reservoir to other aquatic animals and can also be zoonotic potential to human during aquarium management. This paper describes the first isolation of P. dameselae subsp. damselae from zebra shark.

Transmission of avian viruses both bird-to-bird and from birds to non-avian species is a major health concern. Newcastle disease virus (NDV) is an economically important avian virus that poses substantial risks to the poultry industry. Rapid and sensitive diagnostic methods, such as the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), are required to track such infections. To develop an ELISA for detecting anti-NDV antibody in avian sera, the nucleocapsid protein (NCP) gene of the NDV La Sota strain was cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli and the 513-amino acid recombinant NCP was purified by Ni-NTA affinity chromatography. To evaluate its ability to replace NDV whole virus antigen as a coating antigen, NCP-coated and whole NDV-coated ELISAs were tested and compared using a panel of NDV positive antisera from chickens. Results using purified NCP were highly correlated with those obtained using whole NDV (r=0.927), demonstrating that recombinant NCP expressed in Escherichia coli is a suitable substitute antigen for whole NDV in a diagnostic ELISA.

Cutaneous leiomyomas (leiomyosarcomas) are smooth muscle tumors that occur single or as multiple lesions. They usually arise from the arrector pili muscles (piloleiomyomas) and less commonly from the muscle of veins (angioleiomyomas). This report describes histologic and immunohistochemical features of one cutaneous piloleiomyoma and two angioleiomyosarcomas. Three 7-12-year-old female dogs were presented with single or double cutaneous nodules. Histologically, the neoplastic masses were composed of densely or loosely arranged interlacing bundles. The neoplastic cells were ovoid to elongate, and had eosinophilic cytoplasms and perinuclear cytoplasmic vacuolation. Nuclei were central to eccentric, cigar shaped, oval to elongate. In two cases high mitotic index in high power field, multifocal necrosis and local invasion were also noted. Masson's trichrome and van Gieson staining revealed muscle origin tumors in these cases. Immunohistochemically, the tumor cells were strongly positive for smooth muscle actin. In our best knowledge, this is the first report of cutaneous smooth muscle tumors in dogs in Korea.

A 6-year-old, spayed female Miniature Pinscher dog with chronic vomiting lasted for 7 weeks was referred to the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital of Chungnam National University. Physical examination, complete blood counts, serum chemistry, gastroscopy, upper gastrointestinal series, endoscopic biopsy and histopathological examination were performed for the diagnosis. The complete blood counts and serum biochemistry revealed no remarkable effect to the patient's general condition. Gastroscopy revealed erosion, erythema in mucosal surface of gastric lesions and endoscopic biopsy performed. No significant findings in upper gastrointestinal series were observed, and histopathologic examination revealed infiltration of lymphocyte in the gastric mucosa. Based on these findings, the dog was diagnosed with lymphocytic gastritis. The dog were treated by metronidazole and ranitidine with hypoallergenic diet, and then the patient showed no vomiting or other complications.

Atrophic rhinitis (AR) is the one of important respiratory diseases and causes severe economic losses in pig industry. Severe attempts have been made to reduce the economic losses by preventing the disease. One of the methods is the spraying of antibiotics into nasal cavity of piglets. Recently, the efficacy of the spraying with kanamycin and gentamicin was reduced in the Korean swine industry. Therefore, the preventive methods have been required to be changed based on the antimicrobial susceptibility profiles of causative agents of swine AR. Based on the current situations of this disease, Bordetella (B.) bronchiseptica and Pasteurella (P.) multocida 4D were isolated from pigs with clinical signs of AR. The isolation rates of B. bronchiseptica and P. multocida 4D were 58.5% and 32.9%, respectively. In the antimicrobial susceptibility test, the bacteria were resistant to kanamycin and gentamicin which have been used as the spraying agents, but they were susceptible to amikacin. A new spraying agent was developed using amikacin using β-glucan and yakbaltag as supplementary agents. Field efficacy of the agent was carried out with different schedule. The results from this study suggested that the newly developed spraying agents might be helpful to prevent AR in swine.

Paratuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (Mpt) is a chronic infectious enteric disease with deleterious impact on the performance in ruminants. In Korea, ELISA has been introduced to detect antibodies to Mpt in individual cattle. However, comparison study with ELISA has not been studied until now. In total, a panel of 899 serum samples obtained from dairy cattle was analyzed with two commercial ELISAs for Mpt to assess the performance. Two ELISAs employed in this study were both licensed worldwide. Two ELISAs applied onto same serum samples showed the morderate agreement (kappa value = 0.06). There was non-significant McNemar test (p=0.0614) between two ELISA results indicating that each proportion detected by two kits did not differ. In addition, the percent agreement between two ELISA results was turned out to be 96.8% which interpreted excellent reproducibility. It was shown from this study that two ELISAs revealed moderate kappa agreement performance. The implication raised is that when ELISAs as diagnostics are used to detect Mpt in individual cattle, positive reaction by either ELISA should be interpreted as serologically Mpt positive due to presumed low sensitivity of ELISAs and their test agreement being less than 100%.