Thanks to a collaboration agreement between the Chilean Agricultural and Livestock Service (SAG) and ChileCarne, SAG received the unprecedented donation of 10 new dogs that are already being trained to strengthen its Canine Brigade, which prevents pests and diseases such as the African swine fever from entering the country.
In this context, SAG’s Director, Horacio Bórquez, and ChileCarne’s President, Juan Carlos Domínguez, visited the pups to check on the progress in their training with a team of experts from the Canine Brigade.
SAG’s Director pointed out that “together with ChileCarne, we have been able to prepare for the future. Chile is counting on everybody, and this donation reinforces the significance of collaborative work between the public and private sectors. This support will allow us to keep safeguarding our borders and prevent pests and diseases not present in Chile from entering the country thanks to a non-intrusive tool that has displayed excellent results.”
In turn, ChileCarne’s President said that “it is our privilege to be able to contribute. The health asset of our country does not belong to the State or the private sector; it belongs to all Chileans, and we all have to take care of it.”
The collaboration began in late 2019, when ChileCarne signed a contract with a Labrador breeder for work instead of show. Later on, after signing the collaboration agreement with SAG, a team of experts from the Canine Brigade used behavioral exercises to select the first five puppies from the kennel. Five others were selected in March 2020.
The team from the Metropolitan Region in charge of the training has been performing weekly monitoring and early behavioral stimulation of the pups with a satisfactory response. That is why they moved on to detector training, currently at 80% completion for the first group of dogs, and 20% for the second. It is expected for the first five to be ready for work by July 2020.
This donation will not only reinforce the work carried out at the Chilean borders, but it will also help validate the theoretical and practical knowledge of Canine Brigade officials when working with pups, thus opening a new pathway to fortify this relevant area of SAG’s work.
Source: Portal Agro Chile (Chilean news website).
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