Social capital and livestock vaccination in Uganda

• In Event: Animals from a Sociological Perspective Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table 3: Human-Animal Futures

Abstract

Persistent livestock disease reduces the productivity and value of livestock, threatening the sustainability of livelihoods for livestock-dependent households. Widespread adoption of preventative measures, like vaccines, can help alleviate the impact on households but in East Africa are impeded by uncertainty surrounding vaccination as well as by limited public monitoring and detection capacities in an extensive, agro-pastoral system. Informal relationships become important in these contexts for accessing needed resources. Using survey data from 424 households across livestock owning populations in Uganda, we evaluate how interpersonal social capital relates to vaccination practices, specifically looking at one endemic disease, foot-and-mouth disease, which is considered a significant problem in East Africa. We operationalize social capital using various measures of interpersonal social ties (extensity, prestige, diversity/range). Results suggest that access to diverse social ties, such as both those in highly prestigious positions and ‘bridging’ to those in different social positions, can facilitate access to vaccines and the flow of diverse information, while increasing social ties normalizes vaccination. Ensuring widespread relationships between government veterinarians and households, alongside targeting structures of social ties within the livestock sector rather than targeting individual households may help increase livestock vaccinations.

Authors

• Ashley Railey, Oklahoma State University

• Susan Kerfua, National Livestock Resources Research Institute, National Agricultural Research Organisation, Entebbe, Uganda

• Thomas L Marsh, School of Economic Sciences & Paul G Allen School for Global Health, Washington State University, USA