Training the next generation of farmers : how UP’s Faculty of Veterinary Science is helping small-scale farmers and boosting food security

Abstract

South Africa has a dual agricultural economy, with an established commercial farming industry and an emerging small-scale farmer sector. Most small-scale farmers are based on communal lands under tribal authority, or the former homeland areas. As owners of a significant number of livestock including cattle, sheep and goats, they play an important role in contributing to food security, employment, and poverty alleviation. The Faculty of Veterinary Science at the University of Pretoria (UP) has a long history of providing support to farmers close to its Onderstepoort campus. About 30 years ago, a mobile outreach clinic was set up as an extension of the Onderstepoort Veterinary Academic Hospital to offer basic clinical services to resource-poor individuals in the Hammanskraal and Ratjiepane areas. This was followed by the establishment of the Afrivet Chair in Primary Animal Health Care (PAHC) in 2011, which provides support and training to livestock farmers within an approximately 80km radius of Onderstepoort