Veterinarians in Colombia travel long distances by boat along the Amazon River to reach Indigenous communities. There, they train people in animal management practices, basic biosecurity measures and the recognition and reporting of disease symptoms to authorities. Colombia’s experience shows that training community members as part of an early warning system can extend the reach of animal health services into even the most remote areas through low-cost, community-based workforce models.
Indigenous communities in Colombia, in the Amazonas department, have organised their productive systems around the concept of the chagra for centuries. Technically, a chagra is an area of polyculture in which staple foods such as plantains, cassava, fruits, medicinal plants, and aromatic herbs are produced in an integrated way. In this same space, animal production is also carried out, including backyard poultry, small-scale pig farming, and fish ponds.
Beyond its productive function, the chagra holds important cultural value, closely linked to the preservation of community heritage and traditional knowledge. While men usually engage in hunting and other external productive activities, women are generally responsible for working in the chagra. They gather, cultivate, harvest, and prepare food, thereby passing on techniques, ecological knowledge, and cultural practices from one generation to the next.
Monitoring the health status of animals and crops within the chagra is a priority for the Instituto Colombiano Agropecuario (ICA, Colombian agricultural and livestock institute), the national authority responsible for plant and animal health in Colombia. Currently, two veterinarians and three technicians support the animal and plant health extension programme in the Amazonas department, a territory of 110,000 square kilometers, approximately the size of Bulgaria or Guatemala.
To address the major logistical challenges posed by this vast and remote territory, ICA veterinarians have trained 26 people from different chagras in the department to recognise the clinical signs of the most common animal diseases. These trained community members, known as sensores (sensors), perform tasks similar to those of community animal health workers in other parts of the world, particular in disease detection and the connected effort to build an early warning system. Their work strengthens local surveillance capacity, enabling faster reporting and response to potential health threats in Indigenous territories.
We trained the sensores so they could identify signs of disease and notify us,” explains Yenny Soledad Infante Rivera, ICA Amazonas regional manager. “Before our intervention, people were not accustomed to implementing preventive animal management practices: there was no deworming or proper infrastructure, which resulted in high mortality rates. Through training in biosecurity, antimicrobial resistance, and disease prevention, the community now recognises risks such as rabies and salmonellosis. In addition, since the Amazon River is affected by mercury contamination, several fish species are no longer safe for consumption. Therefore, we also support the development of safer fish production systems, allowing communities to raise their own fish in ponds under better sanitary conditions.
As the example of fish production illustrates, producing food in the Amazon rainforest is far from simple. Although many communities could benefit from introducing new techniques and improved breeds of poultry into their chagras, this also presents significant challenges. Jairo Eusebio Cachique Hernández, one of the two ICA veterinarians who regularly visits Indigenous communities for training and surveillance, often refers to the case of laying hens. These birds are usually transported by boat deep into the rainforest and, once there, must quickly adapt to completely new environmental and sanitary conditions.
We observed that these specialized breeds showed numerous respiratory problems,” explains Mr. Cachique Hernández. “Although we routinely test for avian influenza and Newcastle disease in the chagras, we have never detected either. On the other hand, the chickens were not protected at night and were directly exposed to the rainforest’s atmospheric changes, where temperatures can drop sharply from 40°C to 19°C within a few hours at certain times of the year. These fluctuations create considerable stress in the animals, not to mention their exposure to wild birds and the range of viruses they naturally carry. Once we worked with the community to build simple shelters, the situation improved. The application of basic biosecurity measures, such as routine cleaning and disinfection, also made a significant difference.”
What ICA veterinarians do in the Amazonas department goes beyond introducing new practices or raising awareness about animal health in the chagras. The 26 trained sensors in the department are part of a national network of more than 5,000 people across Colombia who strengthen the community-based early warning system. Their role is to notify ICA of clinical signs compatible with diseases under official control or surveillance, thus reinforcing surveillance capacity in remote areas of the country.
This collaboration, still requiring sustained investment and resources, has the potential to protect the health of the animals on which Indigenous communities and the entire Colombian livestock sector depend. As Yenny Soledad Infante Rivera notes:
Working with Indigenous communities requires mutual respect and knowledge exchange. At ICA, we provide information and support, but we also learn from them. It is not always easy, but they have survived for centuries in extremely complex environments. It is an exchange of knowledge, culture, and techniques, notes Yenny Soledad Infante Rivera, regional manager of the ICA Amazonas.
This is one of the case studies included in the 2026 State of the World’s Animal Health report. Read more in the full document.
