Summit set to spark brighter communities.
6th September 2010
The 4th G2Z National Summit to End Companion Animal Overpopulation starts today on the Gold Coast and is set to change the way Australia views the euthanasia of the ‘surplus’ cats and dogs currently killed in pounds and shelters across the country.
International speakers Richard Avanzino President of Maddies Fund USA, Mitch Schneider Manager of Washoe County Regional Services USA, Dr Kate Hurley Director of the University of California’s Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program, and Dr Jeff Young, from Planned Pethood Plus, are set to motivate educate and inspire the over 150 delegates from every state and territory in Australia, and New Zealand.
While the No Kill movement has been developing in America, Getting to Zero (G2Z) has been growing as a national movement in Australia.
Getting to Zero (G2Z) is a whole community change model which includes a community vet clinic for ensuring all owned animals can be treated and desexed, a shelter clinic so that abandoned animals can be treated and desexed prior to rehoming, proactive rehoming including foster care and strong promotion of adoption , community education, breeder permit legislation which includes Desexing of kittens before selling or giving away, and desexing support programs.
It encourages state and local governments, animal management officers, vets, breeders, the pet industry, wildlife organisations and every household to use effective strategies to aim for saving 90% of abandoned animals in any community.
AWLQ developed this model based on a combination of strategies used over the past 8 years. These strategies have resulted in 85% of all abandoned cats and dogs being saved in 2009/10, the lowest euthanasia rate for all abandoned cats and dogs in a city of half a million people in Australia.
Attendees will leave the Summit armed with the knowledge and skills to start saving more lives.
Organisers of the Summit, Sylvana Wenderhold and Joy Verrinder, applaud the pounds and shelters who have registered to attend. “They are leaders in their communities who care about saving the lives of companion animals who through no fault of their own have been abandoned by their owners. They will go home and build brighter, healthier and more compassionate communities.”
The purpose of the Summit is to END pet overpopulation.
“Cat and Dog overpopulation in Australia is real but is definitely not insurmountable. We know it would end faster if all stakeholders – not just pounds and shelters”, Ms Wenderhold says.
