The 32 nd World Veterinary Congress will be held in İstanbul 13th to 17th of September, 2015 organized by Turkish Veterinary Medical Association (TVMA) which is a great pleasure for the association. TVMA aims to ensure the development of veterinary medicine with the ability to protect the rights and the benefits of the profession.
The education of Veterinary Medicine in Turkey was first established in 1842, in İstanbul. Currently, there are 17 veterinary faculties in Turkey with the annual capacity of around 1500 graduates and 10 more veterinary faculties are under the establishment phase. Presently there are around 20.000 veterinarians in Turkey; most of them work at Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock as official veterinarians and at private clinics as private practitioners, and the rest of them work at other ministries, local administrations, private sector (food, drug, feed) and universities.
As we all know that, veterinarians play a leading role for performing disease surveillance of specific zoonoses and therefore, they are central to the human–animal relationship in terms of one health concept. So that, the risks regardless of whether they are threaten animals, humans or both, can be prevented at their source in animals.
Within the scope of one health concept, all necessary measures are needed to be taken for control and eradication of animal diseases, also here in Turkey. While speaking about the measures, the measures like; programmed and strategic vaccination, quarantine, test applications, cleaning and disinfection, slaughtering of animals, control of animal movements, and closure of the inappropriate livestock markets can be given as examples. At this point, I should add that, Turkey has already succeeded to eradicate some animal diseases and the efforts continue to achieve the same success for widely distributed animal diseases.
World Veterinary Congress will be held in İstanbul which is one of the biggest cities in the world with its historical monuments and wonderful natural scenery. With its history of over 2500 years, İstanbul had become an important commercial center because of its establishment in this strategic location between Asia and Europa.
I hope that this Congress will help to bring the new developments in the field and also it will aid to share and exchange the information on the topics with colleagues. The main topics for this congress are therefore chosen as; animal health and welfare, public health, food hygiene and veterinary education.
At this occasion, I would like to welcome our colleagues from all over the world and looking forward to meeting you at the congress. Besides a unique change to interact with our colleagues, you may also have the opportunity to visit historical places in Turkey and taste Turkish cuisine.
World Veterinary Congress, İstanbul – 2015
Veterinary Education Worldwide 