Canada: New board to address complex disease challenges

The African Swine Fever Executive Management Board (ASF-EMB) demonstrated the power of a collaborative approach to addressing complex disease challenges. Building on this success, stakeholders in Canada’s livestock and poultry sectors have created the Foreign Animal Disease Executive Management Board (FAD-EMB) to address foot and mouth disease (FMD), African swine fever (ASF), and highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) with the purpose to establish a collaborative process for disease prevention, preparedness and response with federal, provincial, territorial and industry collaborative engagement.

The first meeting of the FAD-EMB was held in-person on June 24, 2025. They identified the need for disease-specific work to continue through leadership groups, and there was agreement that the four-pillar model followed for African swine fever is applicable for other foreign animal diseases.

Themes that emerged throughout the day highlighted the importance of relationship building to support this collaborative approach. It was agreed that the FAD-EMB will not be a platform for lobbying efforts but is an unbiased forum for driving disease prevention, planning and response needs. The group recognized the potential for fatigue and the importance of regularly celebrating progress.

Next steps include drafting a charter and populating disease-specific leadership groups to maintain momentum on ASF, FMD and HPAI priority gaps. There was also acknowledgement of horizontal priorities that apply to all species. The FAD-EMB will plan to meet quarterly to collaboratively drive foreign animal disease prevention, preparedness and response.