Talrige funktioner på de små telefoner kan varsle kvægholderne om udbrud af sygdomme og dyrlæger behøver ikke længere drage land og rige rundt, men kan i stigende grad benytte sig af internettets mange muligheder og dets opkobling til mobilerne.
ROME, 1 March 2013: Farmers and veterinarians (dyrlæger) across Africa are increasingly using cell phones to issue alerts quickly about possible animal disease outbreaks at a very early stage and to track wide-scale vaccination campaigns.
Mobile phone applications are making ‘early warning’ a matter of seconds instead of weeks for animal disease outbreaks, and essential veterinary care can be tracked with pinpoint accuracy and speed, thanks to the Global Positioning System function now directly integrated in most cell phones.
“FAO and partners are joining in on this enormous uptake of mobile phone technology for uses in reporting animal disease outbreaks, tracking vaccination campaigns and the delivery of veterinary treatments, such as deworming animals,” said Robert Allport, FAO Kenya’s Assistant FAO Representative for Programme Implementation.
EpiCollect tracks animals’ medical history via the mobile Web
In Kenya, for example, where three out of four people now have a mobile phone, FAO has partnered with the Royal Veterinary College and local NGO Vetaid, to support the pilot testing of a mobile phone application developed by researchers at the Imperial College London’s School of Public Health.
The application, called EpiCollect, helps to track animal vaccination and treatment campaigns. The application and storage space are provided for free on the EpiCollect website, which assigns a unique location for each project.
That location is known only to the users – such as national veterinary officials and field vets – involved in the project. The EpiCollect database is not searchable, so prying (uønskede) eyes will not find potentially sensitive information.
“Cellular phones eliminate delays in receiving field data, since all the information is relayed via the mobile network,” said Allport.
In addition, the information is assigned a geographic location, so locations are extremely accurate and available in real-time.
Until only some five years ago, veterinarians would have to travel to remote locations, record data, and then travel back to district-level offices to process the paperwork. Now, the information can be transmitted in real time.
The data – for example on the total number of livestock in a herd and the number of animals vaccinated – is stored and then relayed to the project location on a project-specific website.
As herds move from one location to another, for example for fresh pasture (græsgange), their movements can be regularly followed and updated.
Skipping the wired Internet directly to Web 2.0
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http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/170807/icode
Kilde: FNs Fødevare- og Landbrugsorganisation, FAO
