Animal medicines help farmers

Importance of Animals

Food security

Animal medicines help farmers tackle the global food security challenges of today and tomorrow.

Food security is one of the great challenges of our time. The World Food Program describes people as food secure when they have “availability and access at all times to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life.”

Animal medicines protect the food security of millions of people across the world by enabling farmers to deliver food efficiently, safely and affordably.

The milk, meat and eggs farmers produce are rich in protein and essential to a basic healthy diet. Vaccinating animals against disease and treating illness and infection allows farmers to continue the safe supply of these essentials. 

There’s still a huge amount of work to do in many communities around the world who simply don’t get enough of this basic nourishment, though. 

The world has reduced the number of hungry people by over two hundred million over the past two decades, but the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that a staggering 820 million people do not have enough to eat. 

And the pressures on our supply of food will only increase; a rapidly growing global population and a flourishing middle class means production of food protein will need to double by 2050 to feed a third more mouths than we have today.  

Communities across the globe are becoming more dependent on the animals in their care with every passing day. Protecting healthy productivity for sick animals and preventing them falling out of the food chain through disease will continue to be of paramount importance as we strive to feed a growing population. 

Quick Facts

• Hunger is a global threat: 820 million people around the globe do not have enough to eat. This number has fallen from a high of 1 billion in 2009 but is still not acceptable.
• Disease reduces food supplies: It’s estimated that 20% of animal food production across the world is lost to disease, much of which is entirely avoidable. That’s one in five animals needlessly lost from our food supply.
• Prevention protects: One of the most effective ways to prevent this loss is through disease prevention. Vaccinations and other preventative medicines make food production more efficient, reducing both the impact of disease on animal welfare and the need for further treatment.
• Antibiotics are essential: Even with these measures, it isn’t possible to prevent disease entirely and at some point, some animals on a farm will get sick. When this happens, it’s essential that farmers have tools like antibiotics to nurse their animals back to health so they can continue to be a valuable source of milk, meat and eggs for their community.
• Medicines improve food security: More than 1 billion people rely on livestock for their food and income. Improving the efficiency of livestock production with tools like animal medicines can be one of the most effective ways to improve the food security of their families, communities and nations.