Establishment and Equipping of a Veterinary Extension Centre

Establishment and Equipping of a Veterinary Extension Centre for Livestock Keepers

From supporting herds to building the service that protects them

A centre equipped with medical, veterinary, and laboratory instruments serving livestock keepers in the Khan Younis and Middle governorates

Distributing livestock to keepers is a first step, but whether those herds survive depends on something else: a veterinary service capable of examination, diagnosis, and follow-up. A disease left undiagnosed can wipe out an entire flock, erasing years of investment and months of work along with it.

Working from that understanding, the Gaza Society for Sustainable Agriculture and Friendly Environment (SAFE) moved from supporting herds to building the service that protects them, establishing a veterinary extension centre in June 2004, funded by the Al-Islah Society of the Kingdom of Bahrain, at a total cost of USD 24,300.

The Project in Numbers

• One extension centre equipped with appropriate facilities and instruments
• Medical, veterinary, and laboratory equipment for examining and monitoring livestock herds
• Six months of continuous service to livestock keepers
• Two governorates served: Khan Younis and Middle
• USD 24,300 total cost of establishment and equipping

Why an Extension Centre?

Because the gap was never in the number of head, but in the capacity to protect them. A smallholder in a rural area has no access to a laboratory to test samples from their flock, and no access to early diagnosis that halts the spread of disease before it becomes a total loss.

A centre equipped with laboratory and veterinary diagnostic instruments delivers:

• Early diagnosis that reduces mortality losses and protects the keeper's investment
• Regular monitoring of herd health and productive condition
• Knowledge transfer through veterinary extension, raising the keeper's own capacity to manage their flock
• Permanent service infrastructure that outlasts the project rather than ending with its funding

SAFE's Role

SAFE led the project drawing on its agricultural and veterinary expertise: assessing the needs of livestock keepers in both governorates, defining the technical specifications for the required medical, veterinary, and laboratory equipment, procuring it and equipping the centre, and operating the service delivering examinations and veterinary extension to keepers throughout the project period.

Partnership for Sustainable Service Infrastructure

The project reflects the value of partnership with Gulf charitable institutions in supporting service infrastructure for Gaza's agricultural sector. With support from the Al-Islah Society of the Kingdom of Bahrain, a relatively modest grant became technical service infrastructure serving a broad community of livestock keepers — a mode of intervention whose impact reaches well beyond its direct beneficiary count.

Protecting one flock takes a veterinarian. Protecting the flocks of two governorates takes a centre. That is what was built here.