Jacques van Rooyen, PhD
Jacques grew up livestock farming in extensive rangeland systems throughout various parts of South Africa. He has a BSc(Agric) Animal/Wildlife Science, BSc Honors (Wildlife Management), MSc (Agric) Animal Science and obtained his PhD from the Faculty of Veterinary Science, UP, in Veterinary Tropical Diseases. He served the wildlife and conservation industry as rangeland ecologist and wildlife management specialist but dedicated most of his 20-year long career serving communal farming systems at the wildlife-livestock interface in Southern and East Africa. Jacques was a lecturer at the Faculty of Veterinary Science in the field of One Health from 2010-2017 during which he led the Mnisi Community Programme, a multidisciplinary research and development programme at the wildlife-livestock-community interface next to Kruger National Park, South Africa. Jacques developed the Herding 4 Health Model more than 10 years ago and led its introduction and implementation in more than eight countries in Southern and Eastern Africa through multi-institutional collaborations. He is leading the effort to professionalize herding in Africa and led the design of herder training curricula and career pathing strategies and collaborations, including market system development innovations for areas burdened by animal disease control restrictions. Currently he is a director and co-founder of Herding 4 Hope – an organization dedicated to supporting organizations and entities to empower communal farmers to develop thriving farming systems through regenerative, wildlife friendly, climate smart farming practices as they apply the Herding 4 Health Model in Africa. Jacques serves on several multidisciplinary technical working groups in the sustainable livestock and biodiversity conservation arenas across the region.