Grassroots veterinary network: Both lacking and weak
The complicated developments of livestock and poultry diseases in recent years have shown that the role and responsibility of the grassroots veterinary network is increasingly important. However, due to lack of attention and appropriate policies, this network still has many shortcomings.
(Baonghean) -The complicated developments of livestock and poultry diseases in recent years have shown that the role and responsibility of the grassroots veterinary network is increasingly important. However, due to lack of attention and appropriate policies, this network still has many shortcomings.
Currently, the whole province has 479 communes, which have basically arranged veterinary staff to be stationed in the area. In mountainous districts, each district veterinary station is arranged with 3 staff, each commune has 1 staff. With complex terrain, combined with the fact that livestock and poultry of the people are mainly raised in the form of free-range, it is very difficult for veterinary staff to manage. In the plain districts, although the area is narrow, the number of livestock and poultry is relatively large. On average, 1 veterinary staff has to manage about 20 thousand livestock and poultry. From here, monitoring and grasping the epidemic situation in the communes is difficult, reporting the epidemic situation from the commune to the district is sometimes not timely; vaccination and disinfection campaigns are often prolonged due to lack of necessary human resources.
Mr. Trinh Duc Kien, a veterinary officer of Hung Loi commune (Hung Nguyen) shared: "Every time we vaccinate or spray disinfectant, we have to hire people to do it. But it is getting harder and harder to hire people because of the toxic elements, so many people do not want to do it. Moreover, it is impossible for one person to manage the total livestock and poultry of 9 hamlets, which number up to thousands of animals."
In addition to the small veterinary staff, it is worth noting that this force is weak in professional capacity. According to Mr. Tran Minh Hanh, Deputy Head of the Provincial Veterinary Department, only about 80% of the commune-level veterinary force has been trained at the elementary and intermediate levels. In particular, the professional level of the Chief Veterinarians in mountainous communes mostly has only a short-term certificate in basic veterinary medicine but has not graduated from high school. This is a big difficulty for the veterinary sector when an epidemic occurs.
It can be said that the reason why the commune veterinary staff are not enthusiastic about their assigned work is because the allowance is too low. Currently, commune veterinary staff in the province are receiving an allowance coefficient of 0.5 compared to the minimum wage.
Because the allowance is too low, many grassroots veterinary officers have taken advantage of people's sick livestock and poultry to charge excessively high service fees, taken advantage of epidemics to practice for illegal profits, used veterinary drugs not in accordance with regulations, used many tricks to oppress pet owners... More dangerously, they can violate State regulations on veterinary work such as detecting but not declaring epidemics, including dangerous epidemics such as foot-and-mouth disease, avian influenza, falsely declaring quantities to "eat" State money... Arbitrary practice of veterinary services is one of the reasons that makes epidemics spread, spread and difficult to extinguish in time.
In addition to the low allowance, there is currently a shortage of equipment and supplies for vaccination. According to Mr. Ngo Duc Quynh, Head of the Hung Nguyen District Veterinary Station, “Every time there is a vaccination campaign, the commune veterinary staff face many difficulties in receiving the medicine. However, due to improper storage, the quality of the medicine has decreased significantly, and when injected into livestock and poultry, the effectiveness is not high. Some veterinary staff have not been fully provided with syringes, protective clothing, sprayers…”.
To improve the effectiveness of disease prevention in livestock and poultry, it is necessary to adjust the regime and policies for the grassroots veterinary network, and resolutely handle violations of the Veterinary Ordinance. When the grassroots network operates uniformly and is standardized, specialized agencies are more responsible for veterinary work, diseases will be detected faster and timely measures will be taken. Therefore, planning and socializing the grassroots veterinary network is very necessary and in line with the State's policy on livestock development and the production development needs of the people in the area. This is also the basis for localities to soon have reasonable livestock planning as well as good management of livestock and poultry herds.
Pham Bang
