Dear Readers,
I am writing this page to highlight to you that Singapore is not yet a heaven for all animals.
For the last 39 years 10.5 months of my life, I was under the impression that Singapore is a country where animal cruelty is very minimum, though personally I had 3 different encounters all warrant attentions and medical treatments.
One of that resulted in me having to put a kitten to sleep in 1998, another involved the death of 2 very young rabbits which I reported the case to AVA in 1997. The least unfortunate case happened in 1996, I landed up with a mummy dog and her 2 one day old puppies which I had took care for a few months and subsequently re-home 2 of them.
1.5 months ago, I learnt that I was very naive, there are lots of animal cruelty out there. It is hidden from the public by these horrible human beings who were responsible for these wrongful act. Due to public’s ignorance, the act was also amplified.
As such I wrote a letter to AVA to make some suggestions and one of which is to separate the animals by sex when they are in display at the pet shop. This suggestion will prevent accidental pregnancy hence drastically reduce the chance of abandoned small animals like hamsters etc.
AVA told me personally this suggestion is accepted and they are working on the implementation. While waiting for the process to go through, I went to the AVA website and realized lots of pet shops in Singapore do not follow all the rules and regulations or even best practice set down by AVA.
I asked AVA for the route to report the cases and below is an extract of the reply I received.
As I believe in every little effort counts and I believe if we are doing the right thing there’s nothing to be afraid of, I decided to create this static page.
Please do something when you see one that needs attention. If you are participating in this,
1) Firstly you need to visit AVA’s website to understand the rules and best practices pet shops need to follow. If we do not know what are the rules there is no way we can tell any was breached. Also it is not fair to prosecute others by our own standard hence the best guideline to use is the rules set out by AVA given that they are the regulatory body. AVA Website – Licensing Requirements
2) Try speak to the pet shop nicely first though, but if they are hostile and not willing to listen, then don’t bother, just gather the evidence and report to AVA.
Every little effort counts.
Ruxin
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If you see pet shops keeping animals in poor conditions or have evidence of shops that sell pets without giving correct information on sex of the animals or how to care of the animals, please let AVA know. You can write to the generic email address at ava_cawc@ava.gov.sg, or call 6471 7198.
Please note that for AVA to take action against pet shops for breach of licence conditions, AVA would need evidence against which they can verify the allegations of wrongdoing. Therefore, in reporting pet shops, please provide the following details:
- name and contact no. of informant
- description, date and time of the incident
- receipt of sale, if any
- veterinary report, if any, for incidents that involve animals that are not healthy and / or not in good condition
- digital photos, if any
- name(s) of pet shop persons involved.