Peste des petits ruminants (PPR) is a contagious viral disease of domestic and wild small ruminants. Clinically, it is characterized by fever, gastroenteritis, erosive lesions of mucous membranes, and respiratory distress due to severe bronchopneumonia. PPR is a transboundary animal disease (TAD) with mortality rates varying considerably but as high as 60–70%. It is in the list of the group of economically important animal diseases to be notified to the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). Described for the first time in 1942 in Côte d'Ivoire, PPR has steadily expanded its geographical distribution throughout Africa, the Middle and Near East, and Asia, from China to Kazakhstan. It has now become the most important sheep and goat infectious disease. It is estimated that productions of nearly two billion of sheep and goats, and many vulnerable wild small ruminants such as Saiga in Mongolia, are threatened by PPR. As sheep and goats are vital for day-today livelihoods of small farmers, the fight against PPR should be seen as a program for the reduction of poverty in the world, one of the Millennium Development Goals. Taking lessons from the success of the Global Rinderpest Eradication Programme (GREP), and as PPR shares with rinderpest some favorable technical attributes that have facilitated rinderpest eradication, FAO and the OIE have jointly developed a Strategy for the Global Eradication of PPR by the year 2030.