Speaker bio page for Karim Tounkara

Bio

Karim Tounkara is the Regional Representative for Africa of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) a position he was appointed to in January 2016. He began his career working at the Central Veterinary Laboratory of Mali (home country) as scientist before joining the Senior Management of the Laboratory as the Head of Diagnosis and Research from 1986 to 2000. He has been, for 5 years (2001-2006), an international consultant and staff member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) seconded to African Union – Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) as Regional Expert in Animal Disease Control for the Pan African Programme for the Control of Epizootics (PACE) for rinderpest eradication and Quality assurance for SADC countries. He provided technical support to veterinary services of many African Union Member States in the Rinderpest eradication process. From June 2006 to October 2014, he worked for African Union as Director of the Pan African Veterinary Vaccine Centre in Debre Zeit - Ethiopia before joining OIE in February 2015 as Deputy Regional Representative for Africa.  Mr Karim Tounkara holds a DVM degree (1978) and Ph.D. in Microbiology (1982) from Moscow Veterinary Academy and certificates in Virology (Washington State University – 1987), Epidemiology, Statistics and Economics (University of Reading -UK - 1991) and ELISA and Molecular Biology Techniques (IAEA - 1995).