Fourteen countries across North Africa and the Middle East are part of a new regional effort to improve the prevention, surveillance and control of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), a highly contagious livestock disease that threatens animal productivity, farmers’ incomes and agricultural trade.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), working with regional and international partners and participating countries, launched the Middle East Foot-and-Mouth Disease Prevention and Control Strategy 2026–2030 on September 29, 2026. FAO announced the launch the following day. The participating countries are Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
The five-year strategy seeks to improve disease surveillance, strengthen veterinary preparedness and encourage more coordinated responses to outbreaks across national borders. Its regional approach reflects the difficulty of containing a highly transmissible animal disease when livestock movements, trade and gaps in veterinary capacity can create opportunities for infection to spread.
Foot-and-mouth disease affects cloven-hoofed animals, including cattle, sheep, goats and pigs. It can cause fever, painful blisters in the mouth and on the feet, reduced milk production, weight loss and difficulty feeding or moving. Although mortality among adult animals is often relatively low, the disease can impose substantial economic costs through lower productivity, animal movement restrictions, trade disruptions and the expense of vaccination and outbreak control.
The strategy prioritises stronger national veterinary services, risk-based surveillance, timely information exchange, emergency preparedness and coordinated approaches to vaccination and disease control. It also seeks to improve cooperation between national authorities and regional technical organisations so that countries can identify emerging threats and respond more effectively.
Egypt illustrates why stronger preparedness matters. In August 2025, the country reported outbreaks involving several foot-and-mouth disease virus serotypes, including its first recorded detection of the SAT1 serotype in Beheira Governorate. The detection added complexity to disease-control planning because different virus serotypes can require different vaccine formulations.
FAO subsequently supported a national tabletop simulation exercise in Egypt on December 22–23, 2025. The exercise involved 24 participants from veterinary services, laboratories and governorates and tested preparedness for the introduction of a new strain. Areas examined included risk assessment, surveillance, laboratory confirmation, information exchange, and emergency response procedures.
These national activities illustrate the importance of the regional framework, but the strategy’s success will depend on how participating countries translate its priorities into operational improvements. Surveillance systems must detect suspicious cases quickly, laboratories must identify infections accurately, and veterinary authorities must be able to coordinate responses when outbreaks occur.
Vaccination will remain an important component of control where appropriate, but its effectiveness depends on matching vaccines to circulating virus strains, maintaining reliable supply chains, and reaching susceptible livestock populations. Disease reporting and the sharing of timely information are equally important, particularly when countries face related threats along shared trading routes.
The regional launch establishes a common framework, but it does not by itself demonstrate that disease incidence has fallen or that participating countries have secured additional implementation funding. Those outcomes will require sustained investment, capable veterinary services, reliable data and measurable national action.
For livestock producers, the potential benefits include earlier detection of outbreaks, fewer production losses and reduced disruption to domestic and international animal markets. For governments, more effective prevention can also reduce the costs of emergency responses and help protect the reliability of livestock supply chains.
NBF Insight
The regional strategy recognises that livestock disease control cannot depend on isolated national responses. A country may strengthen its own veterinary system, but weaknesses in surveillance, reporting or outbreak management elsewhere can still create risks for the wider region.
The real test of the 2026–2030 strategy will be implementation: faster outbreak detection, stronger laboratory capacity, timely cross-border information sharing and coordinated disease-control measures.
For the countries involved, success should ultimately be measured by whether these efforts reduce livestock losses, protect farmers’ incomes and limit disruption to food production and trade. The strategy provides a regional framework; sustained national commitment will determine whether it delivers those results.
