Economic impact assessment of rinderpest control in Africa

The authors assess the economic impact of the Pan-African Rinderpest Campai gn (PARC). The PARC programme commenced in 1986 with the objective to contr ol and ultimately eradicate rinderpest from Africa. From among the thirty-f ive countries that participated in PARC, ten countries were selected for th e analysis, based on data availability. The three following key socio-econo mic issues were addressed: cost-effectiveness, returns to investment and th e welfare gains of the intervention. The standard cost-benefit approach based on a computer spreadsheet model wa s used to assess the economic impact of rinderpest control. Benefits of the intervention consisted of increased revenue due to avoided production loss es. Estimates of the value of production losses were obtained under both 'w ith PARC' and 'without PARC' scenarios and the incremental benefits were de rived as the difference between the two scenarios. in addition, an economic surplus model was used to assess the distribution of welfare effects gener ated by the intervention. Analysis of funding for the national campaigns showed roughly equal commitm ent to the programme by national governments and the principal donor, the E uropean Union. Examination of the implementation costs in the ten countries indicated that with the exception of one country, PARC was implemented in a cost-effective manner with average costs appearing within a relatively na rrow range. The figures obtained in ECU (European currency units) were betw een ECU0.27 and ECU0.60 per head of cattle vaccinated. The estimated averag e return from the ten countries (ECU1.8 for each ECU invested in the campai gn) demonstrates that based on the sample of countries, rinderpest control in Africa has been economically profitable. In each of the ten countries, e stimated benefits at least covered the value of the investment in PARC. The programme has provided a total net present Value of ECU29 million for the ten countries, suggesting that: the implementation of PARC has been a wise public investment decision. Analysis of the distribution of the welfare gai ns from PARC revealed that producers derived the greater share of the ECU58 million in net value of production losses avoided due to rinderpest contro l in the ten countries. Consumer gains accounted for approximately one-fift h of the total, due to lower prices from increased supplies.