Improving pet traceability and banning practices similar to ear cropping are among the many measures the EU govt has proposed at the moment (7 December) to enhance animal welfare requirements for cats and dogs.
Through the brand new guidelines, the European Commission goals to put down for the primary time some minimal widespread welfare requirements for breeding and maintaining pet animals, placing an finish to a long-standing legislative loophole within the EU.
Despite EU provisions on the safety of dogs and cats when bred for scientific functions or their non-commercial transport throughout Europe, there’s at the moment no EU framework for the welfare of animals saved as pets.
The legislative initiative was unveiled as a part of an animal welfare bundle that additionally contains new EU guidelines for the transport of stay animals. The estimated annual worth of canine and cat gross sales within the bloc quantities to €1.3 billion, based on figures offered by the Commission.
A serious new function considerations the development of the traceability of dogs and cats, together with when supplied on the market or adoption on-line. The proposed guidelines require obligatory identification by electronically-read transponders for all dogs and cats earlier than being placed in the marketplace, which ought to discourage fraud and permit higher management of their animal welfare situations.
“We’ve been advocating for this for decades,” defined Reineke Hameleers, CEO of the animal safety organisation Eurogroup for Animals, who burdened the significance of interoperable nationwide databases. Although pet registration is already obligatory in 24 member states, the nationwide registries are at the moment unlinked aside from a personal initiative, referred to as Europetnet, which connects nationwide and regional databases in 17 EU nations.
An EU-wide ban on painful practices similar to ear cropping and tail docking, that are nonetheless allowed in a small variety of member states, can also be a part of the Commission’s proposal, along with measures to make sure “a level playing field between operators keeping and placing on the market dogs and cats across the Union”.
“Having some widespread targets for breeders and sellers goes to have a big impression and our residents have been demanding this for years,” EU Health and Animal Welfare Commissioner Stella Kyriakides advised the reporters on Thursday (7 December). The new guidelines are anticipated to use to round 24,000 and 30,000 business canine breeders and between 8,000 and 10,000 business cat breeders.
Human well being additionally affected
A primary name to cope with the shortage of EU laws on the matter got here in 2020 when the European Parliament accepted a non-binding resolution calling on the Commission to place ahead some harmonised system of obligatory identification and registration of cats and dogs to combat unlawful commerce.
In November, MEPs from the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP), the largest political group within the European Parliament, despatched a letter to Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen asking to make use of the introduced update of the EU animal welfare laws “as an opportunity to call for targeted measures for better protection of pets.”
“Illegal puppy trading is a crime against animal welfare and also poses risks to our health,” German MEP Peter Liese, who’s additionally well being coordinator for the EPP and one of many signatories of the letter, advised Euronews. According to him, one of many most important dangers coming from unlawful commerce is that animals might contract ailments due to the shortage of vaccination, remedy, or examination.
“This also endangers the health of all of us,” he continued, including that some breeders and operators are “mafia-like structures”, hailing the truth that the EU “is finally taking action against them”.
The Commission stresses that these measures are crucial to guard the well being of people in addition to pets. “Lack of traceability and proper vaccination represents a serious risk for transmission of zoonoses, such as rabies and echinococcosis, and therefore public health risks in the Union,” the textual content of the regulation reads.
The EU govt additionally factors out that inadequate measures to deal with correct socialisation of puppies and kittens trigger points which later in life could cause critical public security considerations as a result of growth of aggressive behaviour.
Online gross sales and non-EU imports
The sale of dogs and cats by way of on-line platforms and social media can also be rising, with round 60% of canine and cat house owners buying their pets by way of the web. Offering dogs on the market on-line is at the moment regulated in solely eight member states, whereas cat gross sales are regulated in seven.
There is at the moment no particular EU obligation associated to gross sales of dogs and cats through on-line platforms however the brand new traceability system can be constructed on the Digital Service Act (DSA), a recent laws relevant to on-line commerce and platforms accepted in 2022.
“We have this particular system that permits registration and traceability however we additionally want to present info to shoppers after they use these interfaces, to guarantee that they’re conscious of what they received to be searching for,” a senior EU official advised Euronews in a technical briefing.
ADVERTISEMENTAnother facet that the Commission is keen to deal with within the new guidelines is the unlawful commerce from outdoors the EU, significantly from nations similar to Serbia, Belarus, Russia, and Türkiye. Fraudulent actions within the motion of dogs from third nations detected by the Commission embrace faux well being certificates and rabies antibody titration stories in addition to falsified pet passports.
“Introducing animal welfare requirements on breeding establishments, pet shops, and shelters in the EU, without requiring equivalent requirements for imports of dogs and cats from third countries, would lead to an increase in such imports from third countries’ establishments applying poor standards of welfare,” the Commission explains within the proposed regulation.
“Those who export pets to the EU should adjust to our guidelines and situations, we are going to arrange a listing of accepted nations and institutions,” the senior EU official mentioned.
