About 200 veterinary students and 50 veterinarians are expected to be trained in Connecting Town to Down (COTOG) initiative in the areas of emergency preparedness, food safety, and issues around emerging diseases such as Antimicrobial Resistance.
Also, in five years’ time, about 774 veterinary clinics are expected to be located in each of the local governments in the country through this initiative.
The Initiator of COTOG, Dr Abubakar Muhammed there are hundreds of vets who graduate with not-too-good skills in emergency preparedness, food safety, and issues around emerging diseases such as Antimicrobial Resistance.
Dr Muhammed who is also the Vice President Veterinary Council of Nigeria (VCN) noted that the initiative seeks to operate a cross-sectional, inter-disciplinary programme with the engagement of all relevant Governmental and Non-Governmental Organizations and Agencies.
He said the whole idea of COTOG is to see how industry experts, companies, farms, pet owners and major industries of livestock agriculture will partner with universities, find a way of supporting them to come out with research and also impact the training of market-ready vets who are able to change the narrative of our economic prosperity.
“This is Connecting Town to Down (COTOG) which is an initiative of Livestock Management Services which aims at bringing practical skills and knowledge to graduates or early career veterinarians in Nigeria.
“We have hundreds of Vets coming out with not too good skills in terms of emergency preparedness, food safety, and issues around emerging diseases such as Antimicrobial Resistance.
“The whole idea is that any student or graduate we pick on, we give him a stable job. We want those who will create jobs, not only for vets but for the agricultural industry. We are getting to train an average of 200 students and about 50 veterinarians, all will be job creators who will support the industry and can stand on their own”, he stated.
Furthermore, Dr Muhammed said the initiative wants hundreds of vets to secure jobs and also be job creators, it also wants a situation where emergency preparedness will be the core of their practice.
“We shouldn’t be taken unaware of the pandemic, this is for food safety, economic prosperity, and food security and the only way to go is for the students, the early career vets and also the older ones to unlearn some of those things that are not yielding result and bringing about economic prosperity.
“In five years’ time, we want to see one standard veterinary practice in each of the 774 local governments in the country, and each of these clinics should be able to employ not less than 10 people, and it will help to drive good quality animal health services to the grassroots”, he added.
The Commissioner of Animal Husbandry, Fishery Development, Sokoto State, Professor Abdulkadir Usman Junaid while speaking with journalists, said Sokoto state is at the forefront of the Veterinary profession in the country.
“We have been making efforts in trying to bring out programmes that will improve livestock production as well as a veterinary practice in the state.
“We are one of the few states that have the largest number of veterinarians in the country; we have 159 veterinarians all under the employment of the Sokoto state government”, he noted.
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