I have had the privilege of being involved in the CAROdog project since its launch in September 2010, through its main coordinator, the European Policy Office of FOUR PAWS/VIER PFOTEN. Since then, users from around the world have viewed tens of thousands of pages on the website, and other projects have been developed to promote dog welfare in Europe, such as the organisation of the conferences in Vilnius and Brussels that I had the honour of chairing, and the establishment of a working group on the identification and registration of companion animals.
Launch of the new websites - Brussels, Belgium, 2014 (photo: Tisa Kosem)
CAROcat followed in February 2013, and it has quickly become a point of reference for those who wish to implement concrete activities for the welfare of cats in Europe and beyond.
The initiators of the CAROdog and CAROcat projects are the international animal welfare organisation FOUR PAWS/VIER PFOTEN – founded and based in Austria, with national offices in seven European Member States and with a European Policy Office in Brussels, Belgium – and the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale dell’Abruzzo e del Molise, Teramo, Italy – the OIE Collaborating Centre for veterinary training, epidemiology, food safety and animal welfare. The European Commission and the Federation of Veterinarians of Europe (FVE) are supporting the websites with their expertise and have agreed to place their representatives on the editorial boards. For the CAROcat website, the Advisory Board on Cat Diseases (ABCD) is an additional partner.
With success come responsibilities, and the time has come for the websites to enter a new phase of their life. The most evident sign of this new phase of the CAROdog and CAROcat projects is the new design and content of the websites, in which the previous sections have been expanded and new sections added, including for the first time a dedicated space for dog and cat owners.
The new websites contain information about responsible dog and cat ownership and overpopulation; scientific, legal and practical information; solution strategies; a library; tools, projects and programmes; news and events; and a regularly updated special focus section. The available information is all designed to provide the most transparent and direct access for users.
Since you are already online while reading this article, you can see for yourself what we have produced, and any comments you want to send to the editorial board will be very welcome.
If you want to access the CAROdog website you can just click here, while for CAROcat you can click here.
I hope that you will find both websites interesting and useful.
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