NEWS

The Annual General Meeting (AGM) of FECTU took place at the Muzeum Szreniawa in Poland this year. In the AGM the chair of the president was hand over from Pit Schlechter (Luxemburg) to João Rodrigues (Portugal). Beside the AGM there was a presentation of a polish forecart and manurespreader, a visit through the Muzeum and to a National Park.

In January 2018 FECTU, THE DONKEY SANCTUARY and WORLD HORSE WELFARE signed a memorandum to create the Equid Power Network - EPN. It’s mission is “ to highlight the benefits of working equids by promoting their responsible use and care, recognizing them as a valid, affordable, clean and renewable power source, as well as their value in human livelihoods through their contribution to financial, ecological, and social capital.” A website is under construction and the templates designed to collect the data for different implements electronically are ready. The templates used for collecting the data will be tested very soon and will be available in the near future.

The Equid Power Network - EPN

Mission statement

To highlight the benefits of working equids by promoting their responsible use and care, recognizing them as a valid, affordable, clean and renewable power source, as well as their value in human livelihoods through their contribution to financial, ecological, and social capital;

General aims and objectives of the Network

a) To promote the potential of working equids as a valid and sustainable energy source, for sound techniques in agriculture, forestry, environment management and mobility;

b) To raise the profile and protect the welfare of working equids, by increasing recognition of their value in human livelihoods through their contribution to financial, ecological and social capital;

c) To promote the recognition of the importance of working equids by decision and policy makers and by civil society at all levels, ensuring a real development and improvement of this technology;

d) To demonstrate that healthy working equids play a key role in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals; by increasing productivity and income (reducing poverty and hunger), by reducing time and human labour in the production chains, by empowering women and enabling education (by greatly reducing the working effort of family members, mainly women and children), but also by promoting working equids as an affordable, clean and renewable energy source, able to carefully manage and protect natural resources, including soil, water, landscape and biodiversity;

e) To promote modern small-medium scale equipment specifically developed for animal traction use;

f) To demonstrate the increasing progress and professionalization of the sector related with animal traction tools in recent years, for crop production (in all phases of the process), harvesting as well as post-production operations, among other areas;

g) To create a comprehensive specific database of manufacturers dedicated to animal traction (both implements and harness);