History of International Postgraduate Training Programmes
Scope and format of training programmes were regularly developed further in order to keep abreast of new, pertinent topics and to improve the delivery of the programmes.
Training started out in 1963 with an annual 10-month certificate-level “Seminar for Tropical Veterinary Medicine” in German language in which German veterinarians were prepared to work in technical cooperation projects in the field of veterinary medicine in developing countries and graduate students from foreign countries having studied veterinary medicine at one of the five veterinary faculties in Germany to work in their home countries. 129 participants from 45 developing countries and 128 participants from Germany, Austria and Switzerland underwent a total of 31 seminars until 1994.
From 1995 to 1999, three 11-months courses at diploma level leading to a “Diploma in Animal Health Management (Dipl AHM)” were carried out with 8 graduates from developing countries and 12 graduates from Germany.
Parallel, a master course concept was developed as from 1992. Initially, on a pilot basis, one “Master Course in Tropical Veterinary Epidemiology (MSc TVE)” and one “Master Course in Tropical Veterinary Public Health (MSc TVPH)”, each for 15 months, were carried out until 1996. From the three international MSc courses delivered at FU Berlin 38 young/mid-career veterinary graduates from 15 countries in Africa, Asia and South America graduated successfully. The venue of training was Germany and funding exclusively came from German sources. Meanwhile, conditions and arena for international training had changed and funding had moved to other sources.
Consequently, in 1996 the Master course concept was adapted, centering on a partnership approach. The first “Joint Master Programme in Tropical Veterinary Epidemiology (Joint MScTVE)” was launched in 1996 with the Addis Ababa University and its Faculty of Veterinary Medicine as partner and GTZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit) as funding agency. Three joint courses were successfully implemented up to 2002 with over 30 graduates from Eastern and Southern Africa. More you will find in the course brochure.
Subsequently, to address the regional and international demand in transboundary animal disease control a joint master programme “Transboundary Animal Disease Management” for Africa developed.
From 2010 – 2011 a 2-year full-time master programme “Transboundary Animal Disease Management” (MTADM)) was jointly delivered by the Veterinary Faculties of the Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia (Consortium leader); of the Freie Universität Berlin; of the Makerere University, Uganda; of the Sudan University of Science & Technology and University of Khartoum, Sudan; and of the University of Nairobi, Kenya. For this joint programme our consortium qualified for a 3 year co- funding under the EDULINK I ACP-EU Cooperation Programme in Higher Education.
And, last but not least the 2-year full-time master programme “Master of Veterinary Public Health” (MVPH) was jointly executed from 2003 to 2015 with the Chiang Mai University in Thailand (http://vphcap.wixsite.com/vphcap). See ACTIVITIES.