The Brooke - Brooke Country Focus

Country profile

Egypt borders Sudan, Libya, the Gaza Strip and Israel, and the Red and Mediterranean Seas. It is one of the most populous countries in Africa and the Middle East with around 76 million inhabitants*.

Egypt does not receive much rainfall except in the winter months. Deserts therefore occupy most of the country but these areas are sparsely populated.

Most of Egypt’s population lives along the banks of the Nile and the river’s delta area. Many of its cities and almost all of its agricultural activity are concentrated along this vital lifeline.

Horses, donkeys and mules carry out a wide range of work throughout Egypt - Some of them work in tourism, pulling carriages in Luxor. Others carry materials for vulnerable communities like the Zebellin, who make money from collecting and sorting domestic rubbish for recycling. Many thousands toil in the desolate brick kilns of Helwan, in the desert outside Cairo. The common factor is that life is often very hard for animals and owners alike.

Current situation

Brooke farrier doing training work © Brooke

Access to good quality, affordable vet services still remains a challenge for many working animals and their owners in these communities. This is because most established vet service providers simply do not provide the kind of specialist services that working horses, donkeys and mules need.

However, with the Brooke’s help, training and guidance, local healers, farriers, saddlers and owners are taking an active role in providing animal welfare and health services.

Making a difference

The goal of the Brooke’s programme in Egypt is to ensure measurable improvements are made in the welfare of working horses and mules.

Our programme in Egypt reaches out to 230 communities in seven regions: Cairo, Luxor, Aswan, Edfu, Alexandria, Mersa Matruh and the Nile Delta

We work with brick kiln workers © Brooke

In 2009, and continuing in 2010 we will be:

providing quality vet services through Brooke clinics and supporting and developing Local Health Providers (LHP) so they increase their responsibility for treatment and prevention
training paravets and farriers in the communities in which we work
improving animal welfare practices across all regions by providing pre-treatment training sessions; community meetings; and best donkey and horse competitions
conducting regional welfare assessments to give evidence of improvements in the welfare of high-risk animals
at a national level, we are carrying out animal-friendly research into:
- respiratory diseases (Cairo)
- tumours (Luxor)
- de-worming

In 2009, we helped 115,000 working horses, donkeys and mules (across 230 communities) through our clinics and mobile teams; through training local health providers; and by carrying out community-based education work.

* BBC World Service country profile