Cyprus may have world’s highest stray cat ratio, study finds

Local animal welfareAnimalscatsTop News Cyprus may have world’s highest stray cat ratio, study finds Cat Stray Face Eyes Portrait Animal Homeless Young 1267298 Relevant News Cyprus may have world’s highest stray cat ratio, study finds 25 July 2026 Time for kleftiko in courtyards, in the village and in the city 25 July 2026 Things to do on Saturday, July 25 25 July 2026 Angelos Nicolaou 25 July 2026 FacebookXWhatsAppEmailPrintViber Cyprus’s stray cat population has surpassed 2 million, more than double the country’s human population of under 1 million, according to a new scientific study that warns of a deepening welfare and population management crisis. The study, by researchers Jamie L. DeLeeuw and Harry Eckman and published in the international journal Frontiers in Animal Science, is based on extensive interviews with 44 professionals and volunteers working in the field in Cyprus, Greece and Portugal. It documents a bleak picture: a complete absence of central planning, an informal shift of state responsibility onto exhausted volunteers, and the failure of measures taken so far to curb the rapid rise in stray numbers. The figure potentially places the island in first position worldwide for the ratio of stray cats to residents. According to the study, the failure to control stray cat populations across southern Europe is not due to a lack of technical knowhow, but to institutional weaknesses, inadequate funding and a lack of coordination. The warm climate of the eastern Mediterranean, combined with temporary feeding by summer visitors, creates ideal conditions for uncontrolled breeding, the study notes. For the animals themselves, however, the reality is tragic: professionals report that neonatal mortality in unmanaged colonies reaches 50 to 75 percent, while thousands of animals die each autumn from starvation, disease or poisoned bait. The study introduces the concept of “symbolic governance,” describing the gap between legislation on paper and its enforcement in practice. In Cyprus, the study finds, the state has effectively left management responsibility to volunteers, NGOs and concerned citizens, who cover substantial veterinary costs from their own pockets. In Greece, the new companion animal welfare framework, the ARGOS programme under Law 4830/2021, was described by participants as a “ghost” system, in which ambitious provisions go unenforced. A central concern focused on the law’s requirement that unowned cats be microchipped at the time of sterilisation and registered on the national companion animal database. While municipalities are legally responsible for organising and overseeing microchipping and registration under the law, participants said this often did not happen in practice. Experts and animal welfare organisation representatives in Cyprus say the annual state fund of €100,000 for sterilisations is “a drop in the ocean,” sufficient for only around 2,200 sterilisations a year, a negligible number against the scale of the problem. Without geographically targeted, high-intensity sterilisation covering at least 80 percent of the population in a given area, the study notes, such funding is spent with no meaningful effect. It notes that although the government decided to triple the fund for 2026, from €100,000 to €300,000, in response to requests from volunteers and organisations, the Veterinary Services were unable to manage the issue owing to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. The scientific community’s recommendations To address the crisis, the study proposes a series of immediate interventions: Multi-year, increased state funding rather than one-off allocations Mass Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR) programmes with scientific planning and colony mapping using GIS Institutional support for caregivers and free access to veterinary services Public education and the promotion of early or paediatric sterilisation by the veterinary community Island-wide sterilisation plan under way Amid mounting pressure and the scientific documentation of the problem’s scale, the Veterinary Services announced in June the launch of the Island-wide Stray Cat Sterilisation Plan for 2026, under the Integrated Framework for the Protection and Welfare of Animals. Implementation is being carried out by District Veterinary Offices in cooperation with District Animal Welfare Committees, local authorities (municipalities and communities) and registered animal welfare organisations. Individuals and unregistered volunteer groups caring for stray animals can take part only through local authorities or registered animal welfare organisations. The Veterinary Services issued a call for expressions of interest to all registered private veterinarians with appropriately equipped clinics, including surgical facilities and post-operative care space. The state’s aim is an equal and uniform distribution of sterilisations across participating clinics. Despite the launch of the programme, both animal welfare organisations and the authors of the international study stress that such plans require a drastic increase in funding and long-term planning spanning at least seven years if Cyprus is to move away from its negative record in this area. 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