Emergency Grant Aid to Four Asian Countries (Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia and Viet Nam) through the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

March 22, 2004

1. To assist four Asian countries (Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia and Viet Nam) in controlling avian flu, the Government of Japan decided on March 19 (Fri) to extend a total of 1,610,083 dollars of emergency grant aid to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
   
   
2. Since the latter half of 2003, avian flu has been rampant in the four countries mentioned above, and international assistance is urgently needed to control the disease. Appropriate disease control in these countries will contribute to preventing avian flu from spreading not only inside the affected countries but also beyond their borders including Japan and other Asian countries.
   
   
3. In February this year, FAO, OIE (World Organization for Animal Health) and the WHO (World Health Organization) jointly held experts' meetings in Rome, Italy, and Bangkok, Thailand, which pointed out that international assistance is urgently required for developing countries with insufficient capacity for controlling avian flu. Since then Japan, together with FAO, has been studying how it can assist these countries in effective disease control.
   
   
4. Since February, FAO has been carrying out a technical cooperation project for Asian countries to cope with avian flu. The project to be implemented with Japan's financial cooperation will be carried out in close coordination with FAO's technical project and is expected to prove effective, as each complements the other.
   
   
5. In January, Japan provided Viet Nam with medicines (a total of 20 million yen) through JICA, and in March dispatched an expert on avian flu diagnosis to Thailand and neighboring countries (Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar). Japan also extended Grant Assistance for Grassroots Human Security Projects of about 10 million yen to Indonesia and 6 million yen to Cambodia respectively for the related activities such as control of the disease.

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