V.MFS.0444 - Secretariat for the Animal Industry Antimicrobial Stewardship Research, Development, and Extension Strategy

Summary

Antimicrobials are used to benefit human, animal and plant health. In Australia, access to the current range of antimicrobials needs to be preserved so that treatments remain available for injured or ill people and animals used for food production. Poor antimicrobial use (AMU) can lead to the development of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which impacts the effectiveness of antimicrobials for managing infections in animals and humans. The Australian red meat, dairy, pork and poultry industries have formed strong links to share information, opportunities and experiences related to progressing AMS in Australian animal industries. They recently collaborated on the preparation of the 'Antimicrobial Stewardship in Australian livestock Industries report': www.animalhealthaustralia.com.au/antimicrobial-stewardship-in-australian-livestock-industries and the establishment of the 'Australian Veterinary Antimicrobial Stewardship' conference in November 2018.

Since that conference, there has been discussion on how to better collaborate on AMS research, development and extension (RD&E) activities of mutual interest and benefit. To this end, the ‘Animal Industry Antimicrobial Stewardship Research, Development and Extension Strategy’ (AIAS) is being progressed. This strategy is focused on prioritising RD&E that enhances AMS activities, rather than a sole focus on reduction in AMR or AMU, which are already comparatively low internationally.

The AIAS has been developed primarily to meet the needs of Australia’s food animal industries but will also benefit the implementation of Australia’s National AMR Strategy. The Australian Veterinary Association (AVA), the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, and AMR management experts were also consulted during the development of the strategy to ensure the AIAS fit within national and international AMR management initiatives and linked to biosecurity initiatives that impact AMU.

The scope of the AIAS includes:
- AMR, AMU and their impact on best-practice AMS
- food animal industries
- providing a mechanism to fund and implement AMS RD&E priorities for food animal industries.

It is expected that representatives from the human health sector will be engaged in some capacity to create a link between initiatives where relevant.

Objectives

1. Establishing the AIAS steering committee, including the Terms of Reference for members and observers.
2. Supporting the implementation of contractual obligations for steering committee members.
3. Finalising the draft AIAS document and facilitating identification of preliminary opportunities for co-investment.
4. Coordinating and supporting at least one face-to-face meeting each year.
5. Facilitating ad hoc information flow to the steering committee for information, articles and consultations etc. relevant to AMS globally and in Australia.
6. Drafting a monitoring and evaluation framework.
7. Providing support for the Australian Veterinary Antimicrobial Stewardship Conference (AVAMS) organising committee (the secretariat will not automatically be part of the AVAMS organising committee).

Key findings

The AIAS has provided a collaborative platform for education and discussions on antimicrobial stewardship for the food animal industries. This has included:
- distribution of a weekly e-newsletter on recent release of peer reviewed literature and international government reports on AMR/AMS in food animal species
- providing technical support to the Australian Veterinary Antimicrobial Stewardship Conference organising, Gold Coast, November 2020
- quarterly meetings for the AVAMS committee involving up to 25 members from Research & Development Corporations in pork, chicken meat, eggs, red meat, dairy, peak industry councils, federal government and state governments, veterinary associations, industry groups and universities
- a collaborative project by the Research & Development Corporations and the Federal Government was supported to establish a pilot one health surveillance framework (animals, humans and the environment) for animal industries. This research project is ongoing and administered by AgriFutures.

Benefits to industry

The AIAS has provided a collaborative framework for communication and education of the animal industries on best practice antimicrobial stewardship.

MLA action

MLA continues to be an active participant in the AIAS.

Future research

MLA along with Agrifutures, Australian Egg Corporation, Australian Pork Limited, Dairy Australia have committed to funding the AIAS to June 2026 under MLA Project V.MFS.0462.