EU Delegation to Serbia representatives make food donation to dog shelter in Mladenovac

Staff of the EU Delegation to Serbia have given a ton of dog food to the Mladanovac dog shelter. On behalf of the EU Delegation, the donation was made by Richard Maša, Federico Del Buono, Andrej Papic and Nadezda Dramicanin to Branka and Milan Stojanovic who own the shelter. At the shelter, they were welcomed with a loud bark given by over 300 excited dogs.

The Association for the Protection of Animals Mladenovac was founded in 2005 by Branka Stojanovic and her son Milan. Since 2007, the shelter is located in 36 Vuka Karadzica Street in Mladenovac.

“We wanted to put an end to the killing of dogs and to find them a home,” says Branka, who does not mind the cold or the seasonal influenza to take daily care of 320 dogs currently residing at the shelter.

“Here at the shelter, there is no calling in sick or deciding to stay at home, there are no days off or weekends” says Branka. She and Milan take care of dogs on a voluntary basis and have only one paid employee. They work up to 12 hours a day: “We bath, feed and clean after them all day long,“ Branka complains, adding that she would like to spend more of her time on dog adoption.

The Association had been receiving financial support from the Municipality of Mladenovac until 2014 when the jurisdiction over the plot on which the shelter had been constructed was transferred to the City of Belgrade. Since then, the shelter’s operation relies entirely on private donations. “Each month, we receive some 2000 dollars from Mrs. Anka from the US which is enough for one cooked meal a day,“ says Branka.

“Thanks to your donation, we have enough food for two weeks, you have no idea how much this means to us,” gratefully says Milan, a veterinary technician by profession and an animal welfare advocate by vocation who a few months ago wrote to the EU Delegation describing the poor state of the shelter.

“People are strange, they abandon their pets every day, they just tie them up to our fence or the lamppost across the street… The usual excuse for not adopting a dog is that it does not seem ‘dangerous’ enough to guard their yard or tidy enough to let them inside the house,” says Milan with resignation. Fortunately, there are always good people who have since 2005 adopted over 300 dogs.