Torrevieja City Council launches a campaign to promote pet identification.

Torrevieja City Council has launched an awareness and visibility campaign to promote the identification of companion animals.

This action by the Municipal Department of Animal Protection aims to highlight the importance of owners of companion animals (canines, felines, and ferrets) fulfilling their obligation to identify their pets, thereby ensuring that if they get lost, escape, or flee in an emergency, they can be found and rescued so they can return to their homes.

This campaign also aims to promote the identification and sterilization of all cats over six months old, not only because it is a mandatory legal requirement, but also to prevent these animals, which sometimes wander, escape, and get lost, from becoming part of a feline colony or from contributing to the growth of the community cat population if they are not sterilized. Hundreds of cats arrive at the Municipal Shelter each year without being identified, and many of them are lost and cannot return home to their human families.

The Department of Animal Protection also emphasizes that, due to the large influx of citizens and international tourists with pets in Torrevieja, it is important that information reaches them in order to convey the need for animals to be identified in their country of origin, and must be registered in the Valencian Community database (RIVIA), so that if they get lost, the details of their owner are available to inform them of the collection of their pet.

According to Councilor for Animal Protection Concha Sala , this awareness campaign aims "to do everything possible to raise awareness among pet owners that identification is one of the fundamental pillars for eradicating animal abandonment and building a more just, empathetic, and respectful society."

The campaign has begun to be visible primarily on the billboards distributed throughout Torrevieja's various public spaces, as well as in veterinary clinics, pet stores, and municipal offices.