Roaming dogs in Bhutan: a review on dog population management

Abstract

The impounding of dogs, which was undertaken in 2008 was not sustainable due to high maintenance cost and compromise on animal welfare in the pound. A sterilization campaign, which was initiated by the Department of Livestock from 1991 onwards, was not successful in reducing the dog population to a manageable level due to poor coverage. Due to limited funds and poor support from the public and key stakeholders, the annual sterilization and vaccination campaign only covered 15 to 20% of the population. This coverage was not sufficient to effectively control rabies and the dog population. The World Health Organization (WHO) and World Society for Protection of Animals (WSPA) Expert Committee in 2004 recommended that at least 70% of the population needed to be vaccinated to break the rabies cycle and a similar proportion of the population was sterilized to maintain a sustainable dog population. Since 2009, the Department of Livestock and the Humane Society International (HSI) have worked together on a long term National Dog Population Management and Rabies Control Project (NDPM & RCP). The project was implemented in three phases. Through this project, the capture-neuter-vaccinate-release (CNVR) programme was carried out with dogs being captured, neutered, vaccinated and released back to their place from where they are caught. From 2014 onwards, community animal birth control (CABC) was initiated with the aim to involve local communities and relevant stakeholders in carrying out sterilization and vaccination of dogs. Vets and Paravets were trained in all districts who could competently carry out the CABC programme in their respective district. As of June 2016, a total of 78,041 dogs were sterilized and vaccinated covering all the districts. Monitoring and evaluation of the CNVR programme was regularly carried out to assess the impact of the project.