The Brooke
The Brooke is the UK’s leading working equine welfare charity, dedicated to improving the lives of working horses, donkeys and mules in some of the world's poorest communities. Through direct intervention and working with partners, we provide treatment to those animals most in need, as well as training and education to their owners and the wider community. By 2016, the Brooke aims to reach more than 2,000,000 working equine animals in need, each year. Limuru Education and Schools Project Limuru , located in central Kenya is approximately 20km north west of Nairobi and has a working equine animal population of approximately 10,850. The Brooke, in partnership with KENDAT has been working in the area for a number of years providing education and husbandry training to both community groups and school children. In 2011/12, the Brooke/KENDAT aim to expand our reach to more animals and communities in Limuru through the ‘Heshimu Punda’ (Respect the Donkey) programme of which the Education and Schools Project is a part.
The Limuru Education and Schools project is a vital component of the ‘Heshimu Punda’ project. It focuses on educating children from an early age about the importance of good animal welfare and the consequences associated with bad animal welfare practices. The children involved in the project are aged between nine and 16 years of age and come mainly from families who rely heavily on donkeys for a living; transporting goods and water. Through the generous support of the Alborada Trust, The Education and Schools project set up Donkey Care clubs in 10 schools, working with approximately 300 pupils in Limuru in 2011/12.
|
||||||
Jhang & Shikarpur Expansion Project The Brooke has been working in Pakistan for 20 years and in 2010 we reached over 280,000 working horses, donkeys and mules in some of the country’s poorest communities. The Brooke Pakistan’s approach is to work directly with vets and community animal health workers to provide training and education on animal welfare to animal owners and women’s groups. Support from the Alborada Trust in 2011/12 will allow the Brooke Pakistan to build on its current successes and expand its reach into new areas. Two districts have been chosen, Shikarpur in the South and Sind in the Central region, as they have high numbers of working equine and low restricted access to veterinary care. Brooke Pakistan will be working with a local partner in each of these regions, to gain from their experience of working with the local communities and to ensure that we make the most of available resources. In Shikarpur District, the Brooke will be working with Sind Rural Support Organization (SRSO) and in Jhang the partner identified is the Punjab Rural Support Programme (PRSP). The Rural Support Programmes in Pakistan work through extensive networks to alleviate poverty and improve the quality of life of poor people in rural areas. The Brooke understands that in forging partnerships with such organizations they can be influenced to promote animal welfare in their work, but also to support specific activities that impact on a much larger population of working animals than the Brooke could ever hope to achieve on its own. The main focus of the Expansion Project, funded by the Alborada Trust, will be to ensure that quality and affordable veterinary services are available in both Jhang and Shikarpur districts. The Brooke will provide training for Community Livestock Extension Workers and vets and will work with equine owners and users to improve basic management practices. This will also serve to strengthen the collaboration between the Brooke and the Pakistani government Livestock Department across the two regions. The impact of these initiatives on the lives of equine animals will be long term and self sustaining and we plan to develop this expansion work further in 2012/13 and beyond.
|
||||||
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)
Following the devastating earthquake of 12th January 2010, hundreds of thousands of Haitians in the capital, Port-au-Prince, were left without access to healthcare including those in need of emergency surgery. With the help of The Alborada Trust, MSF is constructing a hospital in the Tabarre area of the capital to provide emergency surgery to the population, relieving suffering and pain and saving lives. The earthquake in 2010 tragically caused the deaths of over 200,000 Haitians, left 300,000 injured and over one million people without homes. 60% of health structures in the affected area were destroyed or severely damaged and the quake also caused a mass exodus of healthcare professionals from public and private structures.
MSF’s Emergency Surgery Hospital in Tabarre is on track to open in mid January 2012 and will provide life saving emergency surgery to the hundreds of thousands of Haitians, still living in tented camps on the streets of Port-au-Prince. The hospital’s services will include emergency services, operating rooms, hospitalisation services and support to patients such as psychological counseling.
Before and After! View of Tabarre Hospital taken on 5th October 2011.
|
||||||
TRUST ADMINISTRATOR
This statement cannot convey the true commitment, enthusiasm and dedication shown by the Trustees of the ALBORADA Trust who have a wealth of experience and a lifelong dedication to the needs, worldwide, in these fields. I feel very humble and yet exhilarated to be joining the Trust and look forward to playing a part in its future in the coming years. 2011 marks the start of a significant project to build a new large animal unit at the Bristol Veterinary School, work began in February and the Trustees are pleased to be of financial assistance, via the Trust, in a project that will satisfy the aims of the Trust through veterinary research and education. The new facility will enable the veterinary school to enhance its considerable capabilities and reputation in the treatment of animals whilst also playing a major role in the training of the next generation of veterinary surgeons.” Miles Littlewort 2011 |
||||||
New Equine Professorship announced
The professorship has been generously endowed by the Alborada Trust, which was founded in October 2001 and is named after the well-known race-mare. Alborada, bred and raced by Kirsten Rausing, has had an esteemed career, winning several prestigious races, including twice winning the Newmarket Champion Stakes (Group 1). She was officially rated the Champion Three-Year-Old Filly in the World in 1998. The Alborada Trust's aims include the funding of veterinary causes in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, with activities primarily devoted to the welfare of animals. However, the Alborada Trust also assists with projects throughout the world associated with the relief of poverty, human suffering, sickness or ill health and in the advancement of education. As evidenced by the major foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001, domestic animals are under constant risk of diseases, some of which can be serious threats for human health. This outbreak highlights the importance of protecting livestock against infectious diseases by improving our understanding of their underlying causes and developing more effective treatments. In his new post Professor Wood will lead the management and development of the equine and farm animal sections of the Department of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Cambridge. He is currently developing the Department's research strategy for equine and farm animal science in order to facilitate current and new research projects in these areas. In addition, he is Director of the Cambridge Infectious Diseases Consortium, which researches the evolution, spread and control of infectious animal diseases, including those transmissible to humans. Professor Wood has had a long career working with horses as well as other animals. For over a decade he headed the Epidemiology Unit at the Animal Health Trust in Newmarket before joining the University in 2005. Some of his recent research examines the epidemiology of diseases such as Bluetongue and African Horse Sickness, as well as bovine Tuberculosis and influenza in horses and pigs. He also works on infections in African wildlife that can spread to domestic animals and man. Professor Duncan Maskell, Head of the Department of Veterinary Medicine, said: "I am very excited about this new Professorship. Equine and livestock diseases are important causes of welfare problems and major causes of losses to the economy. Strengthening the already excellent research base in Cambridge, especially in infectious diseases, by the establishment of this new Chair, and the election of James Wood, provides us with a great opportunity to really make a difference in this important area of activity. "I am very grateful indeed to the Alborada Trust for enabling this development with their generous donation, and I look forward to a strong and productive relationship with the Trustees in the future." Professor James Wood said: "It is a great honour to be appointed into this position, and I look forward to exploiting the exciting opportunities for research here in the University across a range of different equine and farm animal diseases. We must address the growing threats to human and animal health that exist in this changing world - and this is best accomplished through scientific evidence."
|
||||||
An update from the Alborada Professor of Equine and Farm Animal Science James Wood, a veterinary epidemiologist with particular interests in infectious diseases, was appointed Alborada Professor of Equine and Farm Animal Science at the University of Cambridge in October 2008, following The Alborada Trust’s generous endowment of the professorship. He had been working as Director of the Cambridge Infectious Diseases Consortium in the Department of Veterinary Medicine for the previous 4 years, in a scheme devised to bring more veterinarians into infectious disease research – linking research programmes between Cambridge and other local research institutions, including the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, the Animal Health Trust, the Animal Health Veterinary Laboratories Agency (AHVLA) and the Institute of Zoology. As well as taking on responsibility for the equine and farm animal teaching and clinical activities at the Veterinary School, the endowment has allowed James to vigorously pursue his research programmes and has underpinned grant income or joint awards since 2008 of £8.1 million. This research programme focusses on emergence of infectious diseases, with particular regard to the fact that most new diseases of humans evolve from animals, including wildlife. The research programme falls into 3 main areas, comprising the ecology and emergence of mammalian influenza viruses, the maintenance and emergence of RNA viruses from African fruit bats and the epidemiology and control of important animal diseases, including bovine tuberculosis, African horse sickness and bluetongue. Highlights have included developing, with AHVLA collaborators, a national consortium of over 15 leading institutions to address the risk of the swine influenza pandemic, for which £1.7 million was awarded in 2009 by the Wellcome Trust, the Medical Research Council and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council. Also, James worked with inter-disciplinary collaborators to develop an international consortium to address the threats of infections that can spread to humans from bats, particularly fruit bats. Funding for this new scheme has been received from various research councils and the UK Government Department for International Development, as well as the Wellcome Trust and Cambridge Gates Trust for PhD studentships working on the project. Although the swine influenza pandemic was not associated with the widespread human mortality feared at its outset, the work of the swine influenza consortium demonstrated substantial spread of the virus into the pig population of England. Importantly, recombination of this virus with other swine viruses occurred in pigs during this period, posing threats of emergence of further pandemic strains of the virus. The research also demonstrated spread of influenza virus infection to pig farm workers (vets and farmers) and provided the basis for future responses to threats of this nature. The work on African bat viruses has involved collaborations with a number of African scientists, especially in Ghana. These collaborations have highlighted the challenges for local scientists of developing and sustaining research programmes and careers in such resource-poor settings. Working with other natural and social scientists in Cambridge, James has collaborated to develop a University-wide Cambridge in Africa programme, building on the success of Wellcome Trust-funded programmes. The ‘Cambridge Africa Partnership for Research Excellence’ (CAPREx), working especially with Makerere University in Uganda and the University of Ghana, focusses on enhancing the career development of early-career African university academics to facilitate sustainable research programmes in those institutions. CAPREx is very grateful for the generous pledge of support from the Alborada Trust to help develop this programme.
|
||||||
The ALBORADA Trust |
