The eighth meeting of the Regional Core Group (RCG8) was briefed on the current developments discussed at the OIE Council of February 2019, the outcome of the last meeting of the Code Commissions, and the OIE Global Conference on Aquatic Animal Health which took place in Santiago (Chile) on 2 to 4 April 2019.
It prepared the upcoming 87th General Session: a common position was provisionally agreed on 4 chapters up for adoption this year ( ASF, rabies, animal health surveillance and killing of reptiles), still to be confirmed during the meeting of the Regional Commission on 27th May; elections in the Regional Commission and the OIE council were discussed; the schedule of meetings of particular interest for the region was confirmed, including a detailed review of the agenda of the meeting of the Regional Commission for Europe and designation of speakers.
Updates were provided on the activities of the GF-TADs for Europe and the OIE Platform on animal welfare for Europe. As regards the Platform, this included a presentation of the initial draft report of the external evaluation which took place from January to April 2019, and a thorough examination of the draft terms of reference of the Platform and the initial draft of the 3rd Action Plan of the Platform, covering 2020-2022. The work on these documents will continue in the framework of the Steering Group with regular feedback to the RCG, in view of their simultaneous adoption by the Regional Commission in May 2020.
The full programme of OIE activities in the region was presented together with a review of possible gaps for the funding of these activities.
The RCG was finally updated on the future regional website, which should be ready by next September.
12 follow-up actions were identified during the discussions. They are detailed in the full report.
RCG9 will take place in Paris on 26 May, in the margins of the General session. The UK will kindly host RCG10 in London on 2 and 3 December 2019, while Kazakhstan kindly suggested it might host RCG11 in April 2020.
