Municipality of Prishtina has started implementing the plans for increasing the number of feeding points for stray dogs.

The feeding and control of street dogs should be done in a systematic way by the state, according to the ICAM network – the International Companion Animal Management Coalition, but active castration and sterilization projects are also needed to prevent their breeding as effectively as possible.

With regular feeding of street animals, excessive roaming of stray dogs is prevented in places with high frequentation by humans, because stray animals mostly wander roam the streets just because they are hungry and look for food and water. Let’s not forget that garbage in every corner of the city should be collected regularly so as not to be tempting to street animals.

We can understand that many people complain about this issue because they want to see the city (and the state) without stray dogs as soon as possible. A country without stray animals is also the goal of our work, because even street animals are victims of a bad and endangered life.

Feeding street animals should not be considered as the only measure for the problem. Animal nutrition is just one measure of a broader strategic concept of having a state without any stray dogs.

When the source of the problem is stopped and managed, such as the breeding and proliferation of dogs on the street, one should then think of proper shelters according to the legal acts that will be approved for this purpose.

All these measures must be implemented by all municipalities simultaneously, so we should not expect miracles from just one municipality. On the other hand, the central level should help as much as possible in this aspect. Without taking the issue of stray dogs seriously at the national level, the situation will not improve.

Other municipalities should engage as much as possible so that their work on treating stray dogs is transparent and efficient without mismanaging public money.

Stray animal protection activists need to communicate more with their neighbors and make them aware not to show aggressive behavior towards dogs, to ensure a peaceful coexistence between humans and stray dogs (and cats).

Finally, the community, meaning the citizens, must help alleviate and improve this situation over the next five years by not mistreating animals, announcing new dog abandonments, reporting abuse, and alerting dogs that are potentially aggressive.