Without a strategic plan, the DVS could not adequately coordinate district level planning to ensure its alignment with the overall organisational goals. A strategic plan could have enabled the department to efficiently prioritize its resources and could have also served as a baseline from which overall organisational progress could be measured. 

## 4.1.2 ACTION PLANNING 

The PMS requires that ministries develop action plans in the form of Annual Performance Plans in line with strategic plans to define what they (ministries) plan to achieve during a particular year. 

Review of documents revealed that the DVS had not adequately planned for implementation of some important interventions and resolutions pertaining to Foot and Mouth Disease Control. While the Department developed an Annual Performance Plan (APP) for 2014/2015, the document did not adequately capture some key initiatives the Department had endeavoured to embark on as spelt out in different FMD strategy documents. In addition, those FMD strategy documents lacked clear timelines for all deliverables which could have helped the Department in monitoring implementation of its strategies as well as in measuring progress. For instance, review of the Update on Strategies for Combating Foot and Mouth Disease revealed that the document only listed the DVS short and long-term interventions without specifying the timelines when such interventions would be implemented and completed. In particular, the document lacked specific timelines for implementation of the following strategic interventions: 

 Expansion of FMD free zones 

 Commodity Based trade 

 Establishment of FMD vaccine Bank 

 Establishment of Disease Control Fund 

 Establishment of Protection Zones 

 Prioritised Disease Control Infrastructure Maintenance 

