Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly says Canada will provide $1 million to help stem the spread of mpox in Africa as her government assembles a long-delayed plan for how to engage with the continent.
The funding will go to the World Health Organization as it tries to contain the the virus formerly known as monkeypox, which has been spreading rapidly across Africa.
Joly is visiting a vaccination co-ordination centre in Ivory Coast ahead of a visit to South Africa for two days starting Wednesday.
The visit to the West African nation is aimed at exploring shared counterterrorism priorities and affirming Canada’s ties with both French-speaking countries.
Joly’s office says she also will discuss the economic partnership between Canada and South Africa and mark 30 years since the end of apartheid.
The trip comes days after the Liberals launched consultations on what they are now calling their approach to Africa, a plan which will include issues for governments to focus on and the best places to station diplomats.
The African Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has asked Canada to donate some of its stockpile of mpox vaccines, although Ottawa has only said it’s looking at how it can help.
The newly announced funding will go toward improving mpox detection and reporting systems by boosting laboratory testing and speeding up research, says Joly’s office.
The funding builds on a $2-million contribution Canada made to the WHO to respond to health emergencies worldwide.
South Africa previously called out countries like Canada for hoarding COVID-19 vaccines that were sorely needed in Africa, and for not supporting efforts to lift patents on COVID-19 medicines and vaccines that are rarely allowed to be manufactured in African countries.
“Canada stands with our African and multilateral partners in their efforts to accelerate the response to the current mpox outbreak,” Joly said in a statement. “We are prepared to assist with the global response and do our part to stop the spread of the virus.”
Watch | Canada must step up to ensure mpox ‘vaccine equity,’ doctor says:
Before the World Health Organization earlier this week declared mpox a public health emergency of international concern for the second time, African health officials called for 10 million vaccine doses to help the crisis. Dr. Joanne Liu, the director of the Pandemic Emergency Readiness Lab at McGill University, says Canada can play a crucial role, as there are more vaccines in the country than people.
The Liberals have been assembling what they first called an Africa strategy for nearly three years, but they downgraded the project last year to call it a framework. In April, a senior bureaucrat said there was no longer a noun being used to describe the plan, which as of this week Ottawa is calling its “approach” to the continent.
Experts in public administration have previously pointed out that strategies are multi-year plans that often have funding allocations, while frameworks are generic sets of principles.
In 2022, senators on the foreign affairs committee warned that Canada was falling behind both peers and adversaries in forming economic ties on the continent.
Africa is bucking a global trend of demographic decline, with a booming young population and a series of trade deals and infrastructure projects that economists expect will lead to economic booms.
Canada has already pledged to come up with some sort of plan for economic co-operation with Africa, and finished a consultation last summer. It’s unknown whether this project will be folded into the broader approach Joly is leading.
Aid experts have called on Canada to better brand the projects it funds on the continent and to have a more coherent approach to both development and trade.
Groups like the One Campaign and CUSO International have testified that Canada is losing relevance through continued disengagement, and thus ceding ground to Russia and China.
