Pet passports will be required for dogs in the Netherlands by 2020. The Dutch government firmly believes that making pet passports mandatory will mitigate any illegal importation of dogs and protect them as well.
According to the international website named, I Am Expat , Carola Schouten–the Minister of Agriculture, Nature, and food Quality–fully supports pet passport requirement by 2020 in the Netherlands. She fully recognizes that the requirement can not be fulfilled overnight and will take time.
The pet passport will contain everything a person interested in buying or adopting a dog should have access to, like the original owners of the dog and his/her medical history. As such, the pet passport will not only serve as a travel document but a whole book about a dog’s history.
“Someone who buys a puppy should be able to know exactly where the animal comes from. The passport will help with that…A major operation like this takes time. That is why we can only put this measure into place by January 1, 2020,” said Schouten.
Currently, the EU has a pet passport scheme in place for residents who want to travel with their pets to other countries in the European Union–which includes the Netherlands. However, no other EU country has made pet passports mandatory, and the book is issued for travel purposes, not to keep track of the animal’s history.
According to a PDF file of the EU pet passport for the UK, the book contains the dog owner’s name, address, contact information, and country of residency. One page is dedicated to the pet which includes a space to place an optional picture of the animal followed by details about the pet including his/her sex, breed, color, and notable features. The EU pet passport also keeps track of a dog’s vaccinations, anti-echinococcus/parasite treatments, and veterinary visits. The new pet passport requirement was probably based on these pages and will turn the book into more than just a document for traveling.
Do you and Fido fancy a trip away? Here’s how to get an EU pet passport https://t.co/0ipnoCZfKB pic.twitter.com/TIxuITwWNU
— Times Politics (@timespolitics) April 2, 2017
In other news, as of September 2018, EU passport rules may not apply to the United Kingdom in the future due to the impending Brexit. The UK is currently discussing the details of its leave with the EU and pet passports are just one of the disagreements that cannot be resolved. Without a proper deal with the EU, UK residents will have to comply with the rules every other country follows when bringing pets into countries in the European Union. As such, UK pet owners will have to bring their animal to the vet four months before traveling, return a month before their departure for a blood test, and visit one last time 10 days prior to leaving the country to get a certificate. For those in the EU, a pet passport is the only requirement needed, reported Bloomberg .
