Thoughts from the President
2016 at a Glance
It always surprises us when we reach December each year in what seems record time. It is a good time to reflect upon the activities and achievements during the year.
When you visit our dynamic website at https://www.commonwealthvetassoc.com you can see the breadth of work undertaken by our hard working Executive Officers, Regional Representatives and Councillors. We are one of the few international organisations that operates without a single salaried staff person and so much is donated and achieved. In particular, I would like to thank Dr Abdul Rahman, our Past President and Executive Director, Dr Henry Magwisha our Secretary, Dr Deborah Kirton our Treasurer and Dr Jeff Cave our Program Director and Communications Officer. They have worked tirelessly to promote the CVA and keep it operating.
As you know, the CVA operates from its membership subscriptions. These are modest in many of our developing countries and our hard-working Treasurer, Dr Deb Kirton has been sending out invoices for subscriptions for 2016-2017. We operate from 1 July until 30 June as our financial year. I urge all Councillors to pass on these invoices to your Membership Executive and help progress payment of the subscription as soon as possible.
This year saw the CVA continue to invest time and effort in continuing professional development. The CVA supported activities in the Caribbean and Samoa this financial year.
In addition, our ongoing book program continued to distribute texts to needy veterinary schools across the world, an x-ray developer was donated to the veterinary school in Tanzania, and an anaesthetic machine was donated to the veterinary school in Sri Lanka.
Our Communications work through the website and monthly e-newsletter continues to keep us ‘visible and relevant’. I would urge our Councillors though to use this website and newsletters to promote the activities of the CVA to their national veterinary associations. This is an essential task as a CVA Councillor. I thank our Executive Officers for their support in new communication’s issues such as profiling our CVA Councillors through the e-newsletters. The monthly recipes from around the world are also being well-received by our readers.
We value our Associate Members that include a number of countries and international associations outside our national veterinary associations. In 2016, the CVA was recognised as an Associate Member of the World Small Animal Veterinary Association (WSAVA). The Executive is extremely pleased with this new membership as the area of small animals has been a neglected area in our CVA portfolio and we now have new possibilities and support in this essential area of private practice.
The CVA will celebrate its 50 years Golden Anniversary next year in 2017 and we are considering how the CVA members can celebrate this important milestone.
I wish you all a very happy festive season with family and friends and I hope that 2017 is special for you all. Best wishes and thank you for your help, Peter.
