Scoping review of risk assessment studies in animal health and trade in Africa

Abstract

Background: Risk assessments are crucial foundations for effective animal health control and surveillance. They demonstrate the safety of a country’s livestock commodities for trade, thereby improving trust between trade partners. Methods: A scoping review was conducted across three major multidisciplinary databases as well as grey literature to identify and classify relevant peer-reviewed and unpublished risk assessment studies on animal health and trade conducted in Africa. The Arksey and O’Malley (2005) framework for scoping reviews was used to identify, select, and synthesize evidence of the different risk assessments conducted in animal health and trade in Africa. Both the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH) risk assessment framework and the Population, Concept, Context (PCC) nomenclature were used to assist in screening and assessing articles for eligibility. The scoping review was conducted based on Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension guidelines for scoping reviews (PRISMA-ScR) and the review process was mapped in a PRISMA flowchart. Results and Discussion: A total of 25 articles were included in the final analysis. There were 15 quantitative risk assessments and 10 qualitative risk assessments. Most of these risk assessments were conducted in Eastern and Southern Africa. The risk assessments were published from 12 different countries of which the most frequent were from Ethiopia (25%) followed by South Africa (21%). The most frequently assessed diseases were foot-and-mouth disease and avian influenza. Although, the findings show that there has been an increase in the number of studies conducted on risk assessments in animal health and trade over the past 30 years, the quantity of studies published is still low considering that only 25 risk assessment studies have been documented during this period. Conclusion: To enable a comprehensive risk estimation, more risk assessments employing the WOAH risk assessment framework should be openly published to inform policy on livestock health and trade and to add to the body of work available to risk analysts.