The Ministry of Agriculture, in partnership with Animals Fiji and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (S.P.C.A.), will be conducting desexing of all suitable trapped dogs during the intensive eight-week stray dog control campaign that is currently underway.
The Ministry of Agriculture is adopting two strategies after the desexing of these dogs which are as follows:
1) To re-home or adopt these dogs to interested responsible members of the public and
2) Release as part of the Trap-Neuter-Release (TNR) program.
All trapped dogs shall be assessed to ascertain their suitability for rehoming/adoption or for the TNR program. This assessment shall be carried out by a qualified veterinarian or a competent Ministry of Agriculture staff.
The assessment shall be based on the animals’ health status, any major animal welfare issues that may lead to poor quality of life, and temperament (if the dog is aggressive or not). This will also help alleviate the public safety risk for any dogs released as part of the TNR program. Regrettably, any dogs that do not pass the assessment shall be humanely euthanized.
All desexed animals under this program shall be tattooed on their ears to ensure that they can be identified as being trapped as part of this program.
Due to the expected increased number of dogs that will be trapped under this campaign, members of the public that are willing to pay the required license fee and are willing and have the means to be responsible pet owners are strongly encouraged to adopt and re-home these desexed dogs.
For those dogs that have not been claimed or rehomed within a certain period of time, the Ministry of Agriculture shall be releasing these dogs back into the areas they were trapped in, as part of the TNR program.
A TNR program is a long-term, scientifically proven, humane and sustainable management strategy that is often adopted in overseas countries to control increasing stray animal populations. Holland/Netherlands is the first country in the world to not have stray dogs after adopting a TNR approach.
TNR programs prevents the increase of the stray dog population by preventing them from reproducing and allows the stray dog population to die out naturally over time. By releasing these desexed dogs back into the same location, these dogs will also keep other stray animals out of their territory. These released dogs would have also been initially screened for aggressiveness prior to desexing.
Members of the public are still strongly advised to be cautious in any interactions and not to needlessly provoke any stray dogs they encounter.
In conjunction to the trapping campaign, door-to-door licensing enforcement, registration, awareness on stray dogs and the related laws shall be simultaneously conducted in collaboration with all relevant stakeholders.