15 December 2017
Biotangents in collaboration with the UK’s Centre for Innovation Excellence in Livestock (CIEL) and Sidai Africa has been awarded £397,000 from the Department for International Development to help combat animal disease in rural Kenya.
The expertise at Biotangents is being harnessed to develop a new diagnostic method for contagious caprine pleuropneumonia (CCPP) and contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP). These two diseases are highly virulent with animal mortality surpassing 50% in both cases making them devastating to livelihoods in Kenya and for much for Africa and Asia. These disease impacts are particularly challenging in remote environments, with little access to facilities, expertise or infrastructure necessary for traditional diagnostic testing. Biotangents’ Moduleic Sensing™ technology however is designed to work even in remote environments with limited access to equipment and minimal expertise required.
Sidai Africa are a vertically integrated distributor of medicines, crop and livestock inputs as well as providing training to pastoralists and rural communities across Kenya. Their mission is to enable every small-scale farmer in Kenya to produce food profitably and predictably by giving them access to professional services and products to increase their yields.
Together Biotangents and Sidai Africa with coordination from CIEL are taking the first steps to delivering diagnostic capabilities to where they are most needed.
In a statement Alan Hale, CEO at Biotangents, said “We are delighted to have secured the opportunity to work with CIEL and Sidai Africa, and apply the DFID funding to our in-house technology, Moduleic Sensing™, to develop reliable diagnostics for Contagious Bovine/Caprine Pleuropneumonia. These are critical diseases, widespread in Sub-Saharan Africa, and this work offers the opportunity to move to the next key stage: developing a pen-side prototype for field testing.”
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