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In Mongolia, a country with a human population of a little over 3.3 million, approximately 220,000 to 250,000 households have an animal companion, and over 300,000 homeless cats and dogs are roaming around on the streets. Mostly living in the streets of Ulaanbaatar, the country's capital, these strays face the cruelest of fates, looking for food scraps, seeking shelter from the harsh climate, and avoiding getting shot by the authorities, just to see the light of another day and suffer some more. We must urge officials to pass Mongolia's first law protecting these animals from harm!

As Mongolians traditionally have had a nomadic lifestyle, traveling with exploited farmed animals from one place to another, often with a shepherd dog who counts almost as family, the homeless animal issue has a relatively short history. However, in the past few decades, the number of homeless animals has become quite alarming for a country with so few major urban settlements.

How did so many cats and dogs come to roam around the streets in Mongolia? The main reason lies in the hands of humans, such as irresponsible guardians who neglect to spay and neuter their animal companions, and people who don't think twice before purchasing a companion for their kids and then throwing them out when they become too much maintenance.

The fate of a street dog or a cat is simple yet so cruel; the ones who manage to survive the harsh realities of the street each help to create litters of baby animals due to the lack of spaying and neutering, and their offspring face the same cycle.

So how do the authorities in Mongolia tackle this issue surrounding stray animals? Every year, the city authorities plan to shoot between 90,000 to 100,000 stray dogs. Around $4 to $5 is allocated per dog, which means between $420,000 to $450,000 is spent each year just to mercilessly shoot and kill dogs!

As anyone with a sound mind would certainly understand, this inhumane procedure doesn't solve the issue in any way. Therefore, authorities should instead focus on the root of the issue, by ensuring guardians and citizens are responsible when it comes to rights for animal companions. Currently, there are no governing bodies that oversee issues related to animal companions, nor are there any official shelters or accessible public veterinary services. A law protecting these animals is extremely necessary to ensure a safe and humane society for every dog and cat in Mongolia. Lucky Paws – Pet Lovers has been operating since 2013 in Mongolia to prevent some of the animal abuse and to help stray cats and dogs in need. Composed of an all-volunteer team of young people, Lucky Paws has saved thousands of dogs and cats off of the streets and found them their forever homes.

In 2014, the group initiated a program to provide spaying/neutering services to dogs in the residential districts of Ulaanbaatar. Every year, around 500 to 1,000 dogs are spayed or neutered, preventing thousands more from being born and facing cruel fates. Unfortunately, a single organization can only do so much, so the group decided to launch an advocacy project in 2020.

The Pet Rights Foundation is currently implementing an advocacy project to establish a legal environment for protecting animal companion rights and improving the guardians' responsibility in Mongolia.

So far, the project has yielded promising results; it has conducted the first-ever major study on companion and stray animal conditions in Mongolia, and over 5,000 people have signed an online petition to demand an animal companion rights law. Above all, a prominent member of Mongolia's parliament has pledged to initiate the draft of the law.

Victory! This alert made a difference for animals! Learn more.