Present:
WCC President – Eric Reijersn
ACF Delegate - Scoot Andresen
CFA Delegate – Rachel Anger
FIFe Delegate – Annette Sjodin
GCCF Delegate - John Hansson
SACC Delegate – Wendy Welham
TICA Adviser - Vicki Jo Harrison
WCF Adviser – Albert Kurkowski
WCC Secretary Robbie Walker
CCCA Delegate - Chris Merritt
CFA Adviser – Pam Delabar
FIFe Adviser - Leopold van de Haterd
NZCF Delegate – Ngaire Dixon
TICA Delegate – Liz Brown
WCF Delegate - Anneliese Hackmann
Observers:
Laureline Malineau (Royal Canin), Elodie Morel (Royal Canin), Charlotte Venet (Royal Canin), Leslie Lyons, Satu Hämäläinen
Apologies:
WCC Treasurer – Penny Bydlinski
WCC Vice President – Jan van Rooyen
1. Opening
WCC President, Eric Reijers opened the meeting at 0925
2. Attendance of the Delegates
WCC Secretary: Robbie Walker, called the roll of the delegates present as listed above.
3. Approval of the Agenda
WCC President, Eric Reijers, suggest that the Executive Session be moved to after item seven, the presentation from Royal Canin, Laureline, Elodie & Charlotte.
CFA, Rachel Anger sought clarification as to why.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, it was thought that by doing so that it would be more practical, to discuss financial matters in an Executive session should the delegates decide. This is currently between items 11 Proposals and 12 matters for discussion. It would make the flow of the meeting smoother. All agreed.
4. Establishment of Breaks
These were established as:
Morning coffee break 1100 Lunch break 1300 - Afternoon tea break 1530
5. Approval of the Minutes of the Business Meeting in 2023
Moved: CFA, Rachel Anger
Seconded: TICA, Liz Brown.
Approved unanimously.
The 2023 minutes were circulated for signatures.
6. Matters Arising from the Minutes of the Business Meeting
GCCF - Response to the Request for Assistance from the WSAVA and ISAG to WCC Members – ).
CFA, Rachel Anger asked permission to record the meeting.
Approved
WCC President, Eric Reijers asked John Hansson to clarify what was meant under point 4 Any judge favouring unhealthily extreme type can be handled appropriately by the Breed Advisory Committees. In FIFe all cats must pass a veterinary inspection. When I am judging that cat and I like the type, how do I know that the type is unhealthy.
GCCF, John Hansson, the veterinary inspection is primarily done to assess if the exhibit does not show any signs of an infectious disease or parasite. The judge is the one who assesses the type and whether it meets the breed standard. Organisations set withhold and disqualification rules and the judge in their opinion can penalise an exhibit if they consider it too extreme.
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, I as a veterinarian look for signs of infectious disease. We have in cage vetting, which would make it difficult to pass a comment on conformational aspects, we aren’t mandated to do so.
GCCF, John Hansson, the vet check is mainly to determine if each exhibit is healthy.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, FIFe have the same, some of you may recall that at the seminar in Florida, Professor Niels Pedersen and Dr Alice Wolf mentioned that the most dangerous area at cat shows is the veterinarian examination.
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, I don’t think that WCC as an organisation can broadly mandate anything, this must be up to each individual member body. It is up to each member to get the best advice from their advisors as to what the disease status is and what is the most appropriate form of vetting for shows. It is something that we need to highlight versus that there is a role of the vet check in whatever form it is.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, asked Leslie Lyons if she would like to address the meeting.
Professor Leslie Lyons, I am representing the World Small Animal Association, hereditary disease committee. The document presented last year was to start discussions, we know there are concerns that may arise and they are beyond our control. We need to start working together on some of these issues.
So, the first one was, as I mentioned yesterday, that if you introduce, mandatory genetic testing for the diseases that are known within a breed, I think you could eradicate Most of them. Other than those that have a very high prevalence like HCM, the blindness mutation, in Abyssinians which has increased in frequency in Orientals.
And that's unfortunate because I think people weren't paying attention. They just thought, we won't breed carrier to carrier, breeders should have taken the opportunity to replace the carriers, unfortunately the figures show that some carriers were used.
GCCFV has mandatory testing, other organisations should consider that. More companies are moving towards packages which include group panels such as Mars has, they are developing packages for those genetic tests relevant to selected breeds such as the Abyssinian & Burmese.
How can organisations educate breeders and judges to promote moving away from extremes in breeds? The Persian gets a lot of flack as this the most obvious, there are other breeds such as the Oriental & Siamese with ears that drop down, organisations need to preface this with the health concerns, you need data to back this up. You only see the best at cat shows.
7. Royal Canin, Presentation by Laureline Malineau, Elodie Morel, Charlotte Venet.
Attachment One - Royal Canin Presentation
Laureline Malineau, Royal Canin, we would like to have an open discussion with you on the presentation and initiative to obtain your feedback. We hope to build a better future for tomorrow, to determine what WCC and Royal Canin could do together.
Questions:
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon I thought that was an excellent presentation and certainly very exciting moving forward, is there a standard for cats?
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, the answer is no, because in this test you must run with it for three years. There is no standardised assessment of participants. Building on that, just to let you know the kind of thing that we could do with you. During the judge commission Elodie did a training on what is BOAS syndrome for the judges, and this is something that typically we could do with your federation.
CFA, Pam Delabar, first, can we get a copy of your presentation? I am concerned about a few parts of your presentation. I'll give you, my background. I am a school trained animal cruelty investigator. I also am a judge with 34 years’ experience. I'm concerned when you when you're talking about brachycephalia in cats, we know of the Scottish study on brachialis of value in dogs. And what they found is that the outside does not always tell us what's on the inside of the structure of the cat's nasal capacity. I know of no study done for cats. Have you done one?
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, I would like to comment that this presentation as we mentioned to you, we started to initiative we stopped. Now today we want to start it with cats and that is why we are giving this presentation to you. So of course we will need to adapt focus, we may find out is that brachiocephalic is not and should not be our focus, but rather extreme ingredients. We started with dogs so will be adapted for cats.
CFA, Pam Delabar, that brings us to the point is that we need operational definitions that we all agree on, on what is brachiocephalic what is extreme breeding, what is professionalism? And when you talk about consumer goods and definition of the cat is that in many countries, we're looking at what is considered property. Our pets are also property. I mean, besides being an emotional part of our lives, there are plenty we have always promoted responsible pet ownership and breeding since 1991.
When I was head of CFA’s animal welfare program and wrote the standards for catteries for inspections. We need to know what the definition is of extreme. We need the definition of illegal trade. I mean we all have an idea of the kind of stuff we need the definition of what you consider to be a professional breeder. Because professional breeder to us, in many parts of Europe and in the US. I can't speak for Australia, New Zealand is somebody that is certified by the USDA it is a government in the US and does not have the best of connotations. Oh, Im a professional breeder.
I'm concerned about safeguarding the breeds that we have; some organisations allow different breeds. When you're talking about mandating or your pedigree, mandating the tests and the pedigree? Who is making the decisions? On what breed? What tests are needed for which breeds? And for whose pedigrees?
There are nine different organizations here. How is that going to affect the pedigrees of these organisations? Is Royal Canin going to come up as a quasi organisation to supersede the pedigrees that are given by these organisations. Again, another hyper tight definition we need that, I am concerned, you talk about educating the young kids that's great for ownership and how to teach kids how to take care of adults, where you need to be focusing is in the best schools, because they are the ones that are being targeted on, you know, oh, this is extreme, if it looks like this, this is extreme.
The judge can pick up the person, we can tell them that the cat has breathing problems, not we can feel it. I suggest you consider that.
Your focus seems to be on Europe, I know about the EU parliament, every country, every organisation sitting here that has federations and clubs in Europe, has been answering questions and working. I know that right now they're looking at adding an identification system with microchips. That can be from one area from one type of data, they can source throughout all the European Union. They're also focusing right now on livestock and the dogs.
If this truly is something we start on for cats, then we have Leslie Lyons involved with testing requirements by breed, get several of the judges involved and the organisations, and we need to know where your focus is likely to be. There is not one of us that will not back down in supporting true animal welfare and health. Because there is a big difference between animal welfare and animal rights.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, for the definition of extreme, there is a very good definition that was met by the extreme confirmation group. I can forward that. This is a group that gathers many stakeholders, it is not only breeders club, but also an association of experts. It is something where they have a consensus, and they fit the definition.
It is not us doing all of that we are partnering in, that's why we are here today to talk to you. It is not it is not us that is going to do all of that we're not the experts. That is why we also rely on people like Leslie and the WSVA that are experienced in the subjects.
I want to mention that it will be different from country to country. It is the same when we present internally at Royal Canin they all have a different context. We do acknowledge that we've started with Europe, as we mentioned, because there was a fire. There was a very challenging situation. I want to highlight what is happening in Europe is going to spread to other markets. You know the markets in other countries. We have the chance that we can be proactive in Europe, they cannot be proactive anymore. They are just reacting to what is happening. So, yes, we will consider the different contexts. We can see with each of you and each of your country, your federation, what is the local context? And then tailor make this initiative to your local context. You were asking about the focus; the focus is the health and wellbeing of cats and dogs.
Royal Canin, Elodie Morel, Leslie mentioned that it maybe not be the main concern for cats. And since it is something, we would like to also address with you what is the main problem you're facing with cats. Together we can hear and have conversations, especially if you want to train the pet owner, video must pay attention to buying cats. We do not want to replace any of you, Royal Canin wishes to work in co- operation between Federations, Cat Associations, Governments and NGO’s, we have these capabilities.
We have a rich network, we want to be an enabler for you to spread the right messages, we really want to work with you., this is an ambition.
WCF, Albert Kurkowski your presentation was excellent. You are right, we are late in Europe. We react with something for most of the governments in the European community, some are already forbidding some breeds. WCF, try to do as much as we can, now. WCF have signed a contract with FCI, the largest dog organisation.
We went to the European Parliament with our proposal about the practice of having breeds and the health of breeding, breeders wealth and health report. FCI plus partners and WCC members, we think this is enough to politically divide what is a professional breeder from other professional breeders or say this is the black market. Now we must show how much we care about the health of the animals, and how much we help homeless animals as well.
Of course, it will vary from country to country to change the relation between NGOs for homeless which are usually against the pure pedigree breeders. Not only in Europe, in a lot of countries are forbidding certain breeds of dogs & cats, yesterday dachshunds were forbidden in the Netherlands.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, it is very interesting to see this collaboration, in fact, we have seen it for the proposal to influence that the proposal was put forward in priority because at one time it was de prioritized. There was a letter which made a push for that. It was cosigned by an NGO, by the FCI by the CDF. In Europe, if we collaborate, even with people we wouldn't think we would have collaborated before. But that's the common objective, then we can achieve something and even if we are in fact more reactive than proactive, we can achieve and prevent that.
WCC President, Eric Reijers one of you talked about how the standards change, practically the standards have not changed, they are subject to interpretation, of the judges. For example, look at the Persian standard, the only thing been added in the last thirty (30) years is that the nostrils should be well open, leaving enough passage of free air problems guess breathing.
The Siamese standard has not changed at all since its inception. Pam mentioned something about the health tests. Like which tests are compulsory, I don't know which Association has them and which does not. We have several obligatory health tests in several breeds, in the Norwegians, Burmese, Bombays, Orientals and Siamese, that is seven or eight breeds, this is decided by our general assembly.
It's very interesting to work together with the FCI. many years ago, before, a lot of dog breeds were forbidden they were not interested, now that the dog breeds are under attack, they are interested and what you said There has been a suggestion, from animal and law, that a profile of a gap the nose of a cat should at least be 1/3 of the skull. If this happens, then 40 – 50 percent of Ragdolls Burmese British, cannot be shown or bred with.
We had a Swedish professor, a veterinarian professor at one of our seminars, for Persian breeders. The presentation was in normal terms, we all understood, no difficult medical terms, she stated that focus of judges should be the nostrils If there is a slight indentation here or there, that cannot be there, okay, that might not be nice, but that's not endangering the cats, but not breathing in the gut.
If you get these gaps with these nostrils, it's not the nostrils that give it away. If it's serious, dogs and cats can be tiny, the cat has no chest. Animal activists do not want any animal kept.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, our role at Royal Canin is to assist in highlighting the good points and promote them, this will give your Federation a greater visibility. The pet owner can understand what a good breeder is and what happens in the background which they do not see.
TICA, Liz Brown, thank you, we' are very excited about your presentation. We are very passionate in TICA. Our concern is the use of professional, I prefer responsible.
We are seeing the extremes type more and more, I don't personally see it in TICA and CFA that judges are awarding these extreme cats at our shows they don't come with their extreme Maine Coons they don't win anything. I'm not saying I can't speak for the other Federation's and I'm all about educating judges don't get me wrong.
I see it that the public, the pet buyers, demanding it, maybe you sell the extreme Maine Coon, or you can I buy it? There's a huge demand for it, that demand is driving the sales is driving an increase in mainstream breeders.
Those breeders, there are a lot of them that are referred to as click to buy, they can buy a Maine Coon within 20 minutes, and receive it the next day, knowing nothing about the breeder, the cat or the breed.
We must change the public mentality the pet buyers, and they need to demand better if the public and the pet buyers demand better, then I think the breeders will have to if they want to sell their kittens, they're going to have to come up and meet that need and be responsible.
GCCF, John Hansson, how many organisations have compulsory microchipping, is it government that your organisation.
More and more people will have to use microchips, and it will become the norm.
Another concern is type, no one has spoken to approve extreme type that doesn't say that other judges do not how do you educate those? Because quite frankly, I can tell them what they shouldn't buy it, because they won't like it.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, we must work together, we have some ideas, but it's something that you must tell us what you would need and how we can help you. That could be, for example, the type of training that Elodie did for the judge commission, but that could also be so in. In the kennel club, they are using guideline sheets that they give to the judge where it shows the normal standard and the extreme standards, so they must judge looking at these kinds of guidelines, and its visuals.
CFA, Pam Delabar, Royal Canin is a global organisation, many of our organisations here are also global organisations. You've talked about we have this group that we go to the veterinarians, how about a council in different countries?
Where is your counsel for breeders, judges and organisations to also give you feedback? Because when you look at it our bottom line as breeders, as organisations, as these breeds diminish, our breeders diminish, our registrations diminish, our bottom lines will diminish.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, I understand what Pam is saying., but I want to say the opposite. I think Royal Canin are very brave to continue helping the pedigreed dogs and cats, I know that you have been targeted by these animal protection agencies as well, blaming you for having pedigree cats on your product, this must also affect your income. I also know that that is not your driving line. Your drive is to get healthy cats now.
It should be simple for everyone sitting at the table. A beautiful cat, what is a beautiful cat. Firstly, the cat must be healthy, it must be sweet and that you can touch, then the standard.
I think that we as judges need to learn a lot ourselves when we have student judges to educate that we teach them the right things and that we also tell them why these things are important.
Royal Canin, Charlotte Venet, we also didn't focus on the experts. First, we will now make changes. We are for example in our community on visual where we are showcasing extreme breeding, extreme breads We are changing everything. We are making sure that we're working with the experts to validate the visual and to validate all the breeds that we would choose to make sure that we have only healthy dogs and cats. We know that we also need to work on things. It's not only asking people to do things, but we will also do something, and we will make the change. And we will ensure that we're only showcasing healthy cats.
FIFe, Annette Sjodin, Eric already mentioned these problems with animal rights groups, I should call them. This is also one of the biggest problems, because in a lot of countries, we need to inform the animal rights group, we need to give them a lot of information, we need to give them we work with the Cat sales. We need to tell them that we do not let our cats out on the street. But this is what we must do, we cannot do it globally, we must do it in each country. This is a start; we must unfortunately cooperate with these groups.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, I want to mention that you may have seen during the presentation that we were talking about the role of the veterinary society and promoting the benefits of pets It is to answer this kind of NGO that are very extreme, you get the impression that they are against pets. They want to have no more pets in our houses, which is why we are trying to promote the benefits of pets. There are many benefits and many hero cats as well that we can highlight like the pairing benefits. Some cats are helping autistic children, for example, we had we had example like that, that we must show that they are key, they have a role in our society.
ACF, Scoot Andresen, would it be possible for Royal Canin Australia to make this presentation to our Judges Guild.
Royal Canin, Charlotte Venet, this would be up to your regional Royal Canin contact to decide.
CFA, Rachel Anger, it was surprising to me that you are facing the same thing we do in the animal legislation world where the visible people are the good guys, but they point the finger at us. There were a few points in your presentation that to me were a little sensitive. I thought that we were not the bad guys, we all need to stay on the same page. I think Pam had a great idea about defining some of the terms that you used.
Royal Canin, Laureline Malineau, we are not pointing to you as the bad guy, we are showing what is happening today, we can see that there are some extreme breeding, we must highlight you as being the professional and the good one, so that we really see a gap between those professional readers and nonprofessional breeders and we call them professional because we don't really know how to call the good and the bad one. We have some similar questions about what a good breeder is. We don't feel that we are the ones to answer that, this is something that we could facilitate to get answer.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, I remember when we talked about the EU and the FCI. I've been to the European Union three times for a presentation of the end of the 90s. and twice in the early 2000’s and had talks with the consumer department. Let anyone who thinks that they will have a link to the EU to be unique and the only partner forget it, because the EU does not want monopolies. They propose everywhere, against monopolies. When they are going to work with NGO organisations or with nongovernmental organizations, they will work with all of them, and they want to work with all of them, we will have to find common ground between all of us anyway. Otherwise, we' can talk.
When you said in the beginning, the figure was only 20% of the cats, and the dogs are bought by breeders, this means that 80% goes from the internet. This is shocking for all of us, because those are people we cannot control.
GCCF, John Hansson, People buying pets think they should be playing free. Most people keep pedigreed cats indoors, they never go out, literally never go out unless they're under parental control.
8. Finance
Meeting went into Executive Session
9. Elections
9.1 Election of a Vice President
WCC President, Eric Reijers, election of a vice president for period of two years as you know Jan Van Rooyen was elected for one year last year because in the COVID times all the elections were a bit of a muddle. who is standing for Vice President?
Jan Van Rooyen
Nominated: SACC, Wendy Welham
Seconded: FIFe, Annette Sjodin
Albert Kurkowski
Nominated: WCF, Anneliese Hackman
Seconded: CFA, Rachel Anger
WCC President, Eric Reijers, Robbie will hand out the ballot papers. Elodie Morel has agreed to count the votes.
WCC Secretary, Robbie Walker, Jan Van Rooyen has been elected for a period of 2 years.
10.1.1. Appointment of a secretary
WCC President, Eric Reijers, Robbie, will be appointed to Secretary for a period of two years.
10.1.2. Appointment of a Treasurer
WCC President, Eric Reijers, Penny, will be appointed as the treasurer until the end of the year. Robbie, take it over, WCC has always had a Secretary/Treasurer, not only because we always had it, but also because of bank access and especially because the bank must change.
Moved from WCF Proposal discussions
CFA, Pam Delabar, under the current rules and constitution, it says all officers should be elected among the delegates of the member associations. So, we have delegates, we have advisors. So, we just elected somebody against the constitution of the organisation. I'm calling for the chair to make a ruling.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, 6.2 states All officers shall be elected from among the delegates of the member organisations or shall be subject to appointment of suitably qualified persons by the delegates. This needs to be amended, when I heard the word may, all officers shall be elected among the delegates of the member organizations also be subject to appointment of suitably qualified persons by the delegates. Because there's someone elected who is not here and someone elected who is not a delegate or nominated.
WCC Secretary, Robbie Walker, Jan is the delegate for SACC to WCC, Wendy is here as the delegate for the meeting.
FIFe, Annette Sjodin, member organisations or shall be subject to.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, Robbie states that Jan is the delegate, I disagree Wendy is the delegate today as she is here as SACC’s representative.
It should be amended to among those present of the member organisations or nominated by the delegates of those present by the member organizations.
I am glad that Pam pointed it out, because this is one of the occasions when we come to an article which can immediately be seen to need revising.
I suggest we accept the election as it is and the appointments and reword Clause 6.2, the change to be included in the next minutes, the rewording is to clarify the intent of clause 6.2.
CFA, Rachel Anger, can we also add the definition of delegates?
WCC President, Eric Reijers, my interpretation is that the delegate is the person attending the meeting.
ACF, Scoot Andresen, can we without prior knowledge make a constitutional change?
WCC President, Eric Reijers, it is not so much a change as a correction. There has not been any given any thought about this.
Attachment Two - Corrected Wording 6.2 & 7.8.2
11. Proposals
11.1 WCF Proposal 1
“that Clause 6.2 of the constitution be amended to include nominations for the WCC Executive be submitted on letter-headed paper, two months prior to the date set for the AGM, the receipt of which shall be acknowledged by the WCC Secretary by e-mail.
Rationale:
The delegated person needs to be informed about the person before the voting to check his background or to ask the further board of his organization if they agree with the person. We believe that point 7.8.2. already regulates it, but it not being done that way in the past.
WCF, Anneliese Hackmann, it is important that members know who is nominated, this gives the member bodies time to discuss the nominee, if the nominee is not known to the member bodies, they can ask the nominating body for information relating to the nominee.
WCF, Albert Kurkowski, all the delegates have the right to know before the meeting and consult with their boards about the nominations and proposals. This ensures clarity regarding who is nominated and who will be present at the World Cat Congress meeting to be voted on.
GCCF, John Hansson, mine. is a quick question. I just want to know how many of your organisations allow somebody not to attend a show, for example, without permission? Basically, we can refuse consent to enter a show and that is down to the show manager and nobody else.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, I am trying to make the link between what was said and the proposal from WCF. The proposal is that WCF want nominations two months in advance, which is the same period for proposals.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, the WCF proposal is to advise nominees in advance.
I would like to ask WCF about their proposal. I agreed with what you said, however in a group of nine, is it so important that the member bodies need to know two months in advance?
I don't know. I mean, I understand it in WCF, FIFe and TICA and understand it in your organisation's where there are more members or more candidates, but do we need it here in WCC.
ACF, Scoot Andresen, I feel we do not necessarily for the same reasons, not for the background check aspect of it, but to allow time for our bodies to discuss whom they want and then provide advice to their delegate on how to vote.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, are there any other speakers on the proposal?
Moved: WCF, Anneliese Hackmann
Seconded by ACF: Scoot Andresen
Passed Unanimously
Attachment Three - Revised Constitution
12. Matters For Discussion
12.1 CFA
That WCC make a coordinated effort to tackle breed restrictive legislation throughout Europe and the rest of the world.
CFA, Pam Delabar, we've talked a bit about this before the meeting and then with Royal Canin. We have Royal Canin’s partner in this global problem. CFA and TICA have been working together for years on combating anti breeder and anti-breed legislation throughout North America, if we could make a coordinated effort.
Eric brought forward Yes, it is true each country throughout Europe and there are 44 countries in the EU alone all with the possibility of having different laws, if we can come up with a coordinated plan of attack, instead of being reactive, we would be actively producing and addressing these problems.
I know that CFA has a as a legislative group, which we pay for their work. I know that FIFe has the Health Group and then you have a media group, your data from Lithuania, and various Federation Presidents, and the Federation has appointed people to work on this, especially within the European Union.
I would really WCC to take this on as a project and work together on our messages. Our message being for one most of our breeds are natural breeds, they have just as much right to exist and to exist in the future. As do leopard cats, tigers and whatever other animals that we protect.
We should be just as protective of our historical breeds, even our hybrid breeds. CFA would like to see us coming together and working together to get this message out, we are going to partner with Royal. We would to be progressive, not reactive, and reactive with many questions and answers on the list. That is the basis for this, i If we don't do this, it may not be in our lifetimes, but we have people that are counting on us.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, Europe has 44 countries EU 27. Let's first also put some things in perspective. The way it has been until now was that legislation about cats, dogs and ferret was a ferret was up to the individual member states. The only matters ruled by the European Union were identification and transport. That's why pets must have microchips when they cross the border. And they should be documented in the pet passport.
Well over 25 years ago, every feline club in Europe, almost 30 had information from their country to work together. The associations for cats and dogs were asked to work together. In the Czech Republic, this was easy because we have only one large federation with a lot of clubs and some smaller Federations, in the Netherlands, there were 16 to 18 clubs, now there' are only six, they had to speak together with the ministry, which they are doing today.
The information that we have now, and I have somewhere also the email from Uri is that the EU is planning legislation on several areas, they are planning legislation on transport, to date not the transport of cats and dogs, the transport of livestock. after livestock, the European Union will tackle dogs because dogs are being tackled individually by the countries. After which, they will concentrate on cats.
We have a list of matters that they wish to investigate, accommodation for felines living outside of the domestic environment, the size, the number of litters a queen may have, breeding age minimum and maximum age for cats. If they have a certain number, then there's a different control. We have reacted to that because that was sent out to the FIFe members. All the regulations that the EU wants to put in place are fewer than the ones that we have. We have accommodation for cats separated larger than the EU, they have three litters in two years we have as well. The only problem is that they have that cats can only mate at one year of age. So, a veterinarian must recommend that the cat is in early estrus and can be mated.
I can't imagine how WCC can make a coordinated effort because if we speak with the EU, which FIFe won't for now. Someone from the EU is coming to speak with FIFe. It will have to be about the EU and not countries outside the EU. CFA, TICA, WCF and FIFe are all in Europe. That is something else. The other countries are not in Europe, they will not be considered.
CFA, Pam Delabar, First, I would like to see WCC come forward with a statement saying that we are concerned about animal welfare, and we are supporting and considering all animal welfare proposals being brought to light in our various locations. Working together on this we can share information.
Let me just share this with you just given to you. The Finnish Advisory Board meeting was this week, we heard a few interesting changes that are now planned to the regulation. The regulation would partly apply to breeders with just one litter a year, minimum age for breeding for cats. 10 months was 12 months. Both kittens and puppies can be rehomed at a minimum age of eight weeks. The rationale for this is that animal shelters sometimes need to rehome younger kittens than 12 to 14 weeks.
I of course commented that this regulation targets to reduce kitten mills., if this is to target kitten mills, this is not the right way to do it. Additions to the regulations on animals with extreme features cannot be allowed for breeding if there is a high risk for its wellbeing breeding hybrids to be banned, another place where we are getting into operational definitions, what is a hybrid? After two C section births, breeding will only be allowed with the permission of a veterinarian.
Authorisation and registration for breeders with more than five litters a year, will only be approved with a veterinary authority on a list of approved breeders to the public, for breeders with two litters a year, a mandatory annual vet check in the cattery.
I think the most important thing right now is for WCC to agree to support animal welfare as opposed to animal rights, that we agree to promote research, DNA research, actual research on the different breeds that are being considered, especially in brachiocephalic breeds.
CFA has veterinary inspections for any breeder who produces 75 or more kittens. This is what we can share with all our associations, make it your own, make it part of your associations rules & regulations. Let's get this information shared. Let us put our association's in a posture of strength, where we are well informed, and not always in a system of reacting.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, this is not valid in all countries you just stated was animal rights. this is vague, animal which animals, in our case felines The people we are facing are not experts on cats that we need to address as well. I have no problem with a general statement. The WCC supports the health and wellbeing of all cats, we can put that on the website, I have no problem with that at all. We can even add is indignant about breeds being forbidden on prejudicial grounds. for example. And other breeds are being targeted because they are really being forbidden only on prejudice, they have done no research. And there is of course, there was a
CFA, Pam Delabar, I hope that we can get a means for information sharing, not for public viewing on our website, a forum where we can have open discussion between member bodies on matters.
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, I think speaking from New Zealand, and we're obviously a little bit more isolated. Although I have heard that these issues were happening in Europe and other places, I hadn't realised the impact that it was having on colleagues.
So, I think we as an organisation need to be seen as the lead organisation, we need people to contact us for advice, we need to be the organisation people say when they are making these rules and regulations, let's contact WCC and ask for their feedback on this. We need to be proactive; we need to get our ducks in a row to begin with, we need to put Feline Welfare first and foremost. I'm very for being proactive about it.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, the wording in our Constitution, states, that no individual shall not contact us. Will we have the time and place for questions from around the world.
There are reasons for rules, individuals who have questions who live in the States or New Zealand, must contact one of the member body’s in the country they reside in.
They cannot come to us because WCC does not have the power to advise them, the member bodies decide on what is correct or is not. Statements of the website is something else.
TICA, Vicki Jo Harrison, TICA has a legislative committee, we work closely with the CFA committee in the States, but we also have representatives in Europe, if I'm not mistaken. We are helping them right now by writing letters. Austria., want to ban sphynx everything they are uneducated about the Sphynx. TICA are writing letters of support. The genetics committee chair has also written a letter of support outlining the facts and pointing out the health and welfare facts.
If we could have a forum to gather the facts and get advice on who the relevant contact is. Being a forum where individual organisations can discuss, help, pool information, be proactive in assisting and briefing people before legislation is passed.
In New Hampshire, it just won't go away. The animal rights groups keep coming, and talking to individual legislators into bringing up things about the breeds which are not true.
GCCF, John Hansson, TICA summed it up, all organisations are from different groups. And they report to different governments. As such, it is very hard work to sort of generalise, what is good for one country isn't necessarily good for another.
CFA, Pam Delabar, Take the information and adapt it to your organisation.
GCCF, John Hansson, I just think we're talking in Cuckoo land, if I am honest, because quite frankly, we' have so many different governments, and they all have their own legislation.
As I said earlier, we have an issue where, when there are elections, cats & cat welfare are not considered that important and are often put on the back burner, in the great scheme of things from governments, they're not important issues.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, as John said, it depends on the country. What Vicki Jo said about the Sphynx, the FIFe Vice Treasurer is president of a club in Austria, a year and a half ago we were advised about the Sphynx not being approved, now they may do the same thing with the Persian. People will attend a cat show, take a picture of a cat in a cage and file a complaint against the owner of that cat. The owner of that cat will get an inspection at home, and they may get an inspector who asks how many cats do you have? Seven? Why don't you have seven litter boxes. These are the people that we are facing.
Leslie Lyons, I have a question for Albert. Do we basically need to develop a lobbyist that would help us for each one of these different countries? And maybe that's something where we could get kind of support from Royal Canin perhaps?
I was reading all that legislation, who decided that cats cannot breed until they are 12 months of age, who pushed them to that? It makes me wonder who is pushing this effort?
WCF, Albert Kurkowski, the doing this NGOs, animal protection groups, who go to the Parliament, we want to protect the animals. We have the proposal to stop breeding of Persian or cats cannot be used for breeding until they 12 months old. They lobby a commercial company, lobbyists in the National Parliament.
Leslie Lyons, it sounds like there needs to be basically a lobbyist to counteract the NGO that is sitting there saying, hey, I'm doing this, as soon as that happens, there needs to be somebody on our side, to argue the reasons and defend a breed.
WCC Secretary, Robbie Walker, Pam, can you draft the proposed statement over lunch and bring it back to be approved and voted on.
The Statement on the Welfare of Cats discussion resumed.
WCC Secretary, Robbie Walker, WCC promotes the health and welfare of all cats and the responsible breeding and ownership of them.
CCCA, Chris Merritt, we aren’t talking about supporting the breeding of feral cats, we need to be specific as to which we are talking about.
CFA, Pam Delabar, it says all cats, the CFA Constitution states the welfare of all cats. WCC President, Eric Reijers, FIFe as well.
CCCA, Chris Merritt, it is the breeding and ownership.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, FIFe have a different wording slightly what we have because we used to have wild and domestic the purpose of the FIFe is to unite all clubs, associations and Federations of clubs, irrespective of their nationality or legal domicile or take an interest in cats of domestic origin, pedigreed or not.
CCCA, Chris Merritt, you are not talking about breeding specifically, where is that mentioned, specifically breeding?
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, I like it, it is simple statement
Moved: CFA
Seconded: TICA
Agreed Unanimously
12.2 TICA, Vicki Jo Harrison, we put this agenda item, when Robbie called for any proposals, we were having some issues with our new club in Australia. And the association's there not accepting our certified pedigrees from our executive office.
I think it was ANCATS that refused the pedigrees, Liz and I met with Scoot, Chris & Robbie about other issues with the club. This was not an issue I discussed with them this morning really because they accept our pedigrees without issue.
I would like you to go back to your organisation's and remind all your club members that a reciprocal agreement between all the WCC members and I just want to remind them of that. More of a statement rather than information.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, it is against the Constitution, where it says that the members shall mutually recognize the judges and registrations of each other provided they do not conflict with the members own rules and accepted breed standards.
ACF, Scoot Andresen, our by-laws applause has a clause which states all cats bred in Australia must firstly be registered with one of three organisations It means that we cannot recognise the pedigrees from organisations that register cats offshore without registering with us.
CFA, Rachel Anger, maybe I'm misunderstanding, you said the cats must be registered in one of the three associations. Firstly, okay. What if it's a US import, a TICA cat.
ACF, Scoot Andresen, that's fine, no problems at all.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, most of you know that the same situation applies in France and in Italy, that cats born in those countries must be registered in the pedigree books there. That would be going against our member in France, it is the law, they must be registered first with LOOF FIFe has the same principle, all kittens born in the house of one of our members must be registered first with FIFe, after that they can be registered wherever.
And basically, that is the ICF thing. But there's another bylaw that states who we do recognize in Australia. This issue wasn't with ACF or CCC.
13. A report from the TICA Genetics committee about a name and colour description for Corin colours.
TICA Corin Report, ).
TICA, Liz Brown, last year, we and CFA were tasked with coming up with a colour description for Corin, and a different name for the coverage it had been called. I went to our genetics committee, they discussed it in June, there has been much more research done on the Corin gene the chair of the genetics committee advised us that we could not come up with one colour description because it affects cat so differently.
You saw that yesterday with Leslie’s presentation. I asked Heather Lorimer to write up a short paragraph explaining this past to be sent out to everybody, it up not being so short, a little technical. I asked her to write for late. That's what she did.
I also just realized that what I passed out was a little more technical, as Vicki said, Heather has simplified it a little. As far as the names are concerned, we came up with nothing., she says she liked the names that the cats are being called now.
Was flaxen or copper being used back in 2023, back then was it not sunshine and bi-metallic. So, whatever the person that discovered the gene worked with, we should just stick with those names. That was our recommendation by our genetics committee.
Leslie Lyons, they are called sunshine, extreme sunshine and copper. There was the discussion that people like flaxen or copper, I think that was one that somebody added recycling the column, right. And then the bi- metallic is still get another colour., that is because silver is added into it. So now it just becomes a copper silver tabby.
TICA, Vicki Jo Harrison, there is a researcher in the United States named Caleb, who is doing a study with the Tabby gene, and he's found several Corin genes. They have a totally different effect than the British and Siberians. So that's when Heather and I talked about it we decided we were just going to leave the colour description alone because there is likely to be more.
Leslie Lyons, Heather is part of this committee too. There is a worldwide push to standardise what we call things at the genetic level. I put up V, WV, and that means variable wideband, that is the name of what we call the locus.
The locus is the “a” locus agouti, but the gene is an agouti signaling protein, that has been standardised, but all the colours are in your hands. Because there's no standardisation, or whatever you guys want to call it colours is going to be fine, but the Corin gene is variable wide. And so variable wide band is Corin then you have these alleles that are called sunshine, shriek sunshine, and copper. But then when you get these different colours, you will have to call them the colours that you like.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, we have of course from the very beginning classified silver and golden as colours, but they are not colours., the same question goes for charcoal is it a colour or a pattern.
I am still waiting as a judge, as are all the judges in FIFe on a description for these colours. I think many of our breeders are waiting for the codes to know how to register them. I understand that we are not talking about 1000s of cats but it would be nice to register them correctly.
GCCF, John Hansson, we recognise certain groups in colours that are possible because we can see what they look like.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, whom of you have Corin as an official colour in your registry, I think only TICA.
WCF, Albert Kurkowski, we have sunshine?
WCC President, Eric Reijers, we should work with other bodies.
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, to clarify with TICA your colour Corin covers sunshine, extreme sunshine, copper and bi-metallic.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, it is the same gene with different expressions. TICA, Vicki Jo Harrison, we put the Corin as a modifier, like we did Charcoal.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, that is what FIFe has done, we have that with Amber and Charcoal.
GCCF, John Hansson, we call Zolotoy sunshine we have to come up with something more general thing.
WCF, Albert Kurkowski, yes, WCF flaxen gold we recognise colour until the next General Assembly, this was also a very special discussion about the new colour varieties. We don't have to recognise even if this is genetically proved every single colour study because we can prove genetically pointed Maine Coon, this doesn't mean we have to recognise them.
Some of the new colours which come every few years we have something flashy and new and so we don’t want WCF to go in the direction that we will recognise everything new, just some of the colour divisions or some of the colours.
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, Leslie is flaxen the same allele as copper.
Leslie Lyons, yes, one of the things we tried to do last year in Croatia, with Beverly and Alex was, a woman who has many of these cats and she was going to come to the show. I was going to collect DNA on these candidates. I was then going to work with Marie Abitbol to get all the genetics done on them.
Bring your Golden's and your Flaxens, your Siberians. We would collect DNA from them all at once and get their profiles and see what the going on. So, we had planned to do that. And then she didn't show up with any of her cats.
FIFe, Annette Sjodin, our FIFe seminar in May, we are supposed to have some breeders coming with these special-coloured cats so their DNA could be taken.
Leslie Lyons, the statement Heather Lorimer put together was great, I think the last paragraph warrants some discussion about whether you want to accept it based on that you've been involved with blood pressure, cardiac disease.
I want to point out that every one of the genes that you guys interact with, as far as colours have secondary effects. So, what mice have Elio and agouti that causes obesity, and dilution and dogs cause alopecia. Most of the curly coat cats should be ectodermal dysplasia’s., those are creating horrible diseases in humans.
So, I think this is just a little reverse don't accept Corin, because we think it will cause blood pressure problems and cardiac problems. Well, you could say that about every gene you possibly work with. Does that mean you should check that? Sure. But I don't think that's going to be the scenario.
TICA, Vicki Jo Harrison, we talked about her adding that in. She is concerned about that. She said, if we had to wait for the cats until they are 10 to 15 years old to know, if they' have this issue, we would have to wait a long time. People need to know that this is a possibility.
Leslie Lyons, that is probably true about every gene, genes all have names that we keep renaming once we know more and more what they do.
14. Matters arising from the Open Meeting
Nil.
15. WCC future meetings
a. 2025
CFA, Rachel Anger, we are having a budget meeting tomorrow morning at 6am. We will find out what our financial grant is from our association and plan accordingly, there may or may not be a show. But we have some ideas.
b. 2026
GCCF, John Hansson, we will host 2026, is there a venue or an area you would prefer WCC President, Eric Reijers, preferably not too far from an airport.
c. 2027
WCC President, Eric Reijers, there used to be a traditional date, which is around this period of the year, this has been changed many times. This may mean that from one World Cat Congress to the next might be one and a half year or half a year.
16. Any Other Business
NZCF, Ngaire Dixon, I would like it minuted, special thanks to our host ARC for the great hospitality every delegate here and to WCC for organising the meeting. It takes an awful lot of time out of our busy lives to attend, we do this out of passion.
CFA, Rachel Anger, I would like to add on top of that and add thanks to Royal Canin for their ongoing partnership.
WCC President, Eric Reijers, thank you, Royal Canin say
17. Meeting closed 1430
Eric Reijers – WCC President
Robbie Walker – WCC Secretary
Scoot Andresen (Delegate for ACF)
Chris Merritt (Delegate for CCCA)
Rachel Anger (Delegate for CFA)
Annette Sjodin (Delegate for FIFe)
John Hansson (Delegate for GCCF)
Ngaire Dixon (Delegate for NZCF)
Wendy Welham (Delegate for SACC)
Liz Brown (Delegate for TICA)
Anneliese Hackmann (Delegate for WCF)
