Indonesian Veterinary Training Program
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Indonesian Veterinary Training Program (IVTP) is a network of relevant conservation and medical professionals and nongovernmental organizations that was established in order to share expertise as groundwork for active conservation. IVTP is led by Dr. Darin Collins, director of Animal Health at Woodland Park Zoo, Seattle, Washington, United States. The program was first introduced in 1999, when the Indonesian Veterinary Medical Association (IVMA) and Woodland Park Zoo joined forces to create the network of conservation and scientific collaborators. This exchange of knowledge provides benefi ts for all of the participants involved; the support provided by the program helps each to build local capacity to care for and protect the health of wildlife in Indonesia and surrounding SE Asian countries.
Indonesia is the third most populous country in the world with 225 million people and the largest archipelago, with more than 17,000 islands (6,000 of them inhabited) and over 25 percent of the world’s biodiversity. The complexity of the country’s geography causes the in-country network to be slow and communication is not always easily coordinated. Recent natural disasters such as last year’s tsunami and the recent massive earthquakes and volcano eruptions have contributed to this. Dr. Collins believes that one route to conservation success is opening a sustainable working relationship between zoo and wildlife professionals in Indonesia and the United States. Conservation-minded IVTP participants now include organizations across several Asia Pacific countries involved in disaster preparedness, government wildlife policies, zoos, veterinary practitioners in domestic and exotic animal medicine, rehabilitation centers and sanctuaries.
Dr. Collins first started building the network knowledge base by traveling to Indonesia to hold workshops. There were initiated by the IVMA, and were eventually expanded by inviting individual veterinarians to the United States to pursue further study.
