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| Win for PAWS in battle against trade in dog meat |
| Quezon City officials agree to build centralised dog pound |
The Philippines Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) has successfully lobbied the Quezon City government to build a centralised dog pound, which will help stop the booming trade in dog meat in the city.
PAWS, which in May 2007 received a second “Friends….or Food?” grant of US$9,000 from Animals Asia, will work closely with the government in the construction of the pound, as well as implementing the city’s first dog registration and rabies vaccination programme and database.
PAWS programme director Anna Nieves Cabrera said the lack of an animal shelter had contributed to the flourishing trade in dog meat in the city. “Quezon City has already been identified as the biggest source of live dogs for the dog meat trade,” Anna said. “As the only big city without a centralised dog pound, all its 142 barangays (towns) are doing some form of "impoundment" of stray dogs. Barangay officials are usually anxious to get rid of these dogs as they have neither the budget nor the facilities to keep them.”
“Hence, majority of these officers often turn a blind eye to where their staff members eventually take the unclaimed dogs, but we all know that these hapless creatures end up in the hands of traders.”
After a series of meetings with PAWS and with the help of Councillor Bernadette Herrera-Dy, PAWS was finally able to convince Mayor Sonny Belmonte to build a centralised dog pound. PAWS will help supervise the facility and this will effectively cut down one of the dog meat traders' primary sources of live dogs.
Anna said the new city dog shelter would ensure that dogs were better cared for, put up for adoption or humanely euthanized.
PAWS volunteers are helping out with the dog registration and we will set up the first database in the country of the number of dogs per household. A pilot registration and vaccination programme has started in Bagong Pag-asa. The database will include a record of each dog’s vaccination, a photo of the dog and the owner’s name.
Congratulations to Anna and PAWS on this great success! |
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| Local boys bring along their puppies to be registered and vaccinated against rabies. |
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| Photos of all registered dogs and names of owners will be kept on the new database. |
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