Jordan is building a national system to manage its stray-dog population. Nineteen shelters, a central database, sterilisation, vaccination and identification are all part of the developing programme.
At the same time, animal-welfare organisations are reporting large numbers of dogs living in the remote Safawi desert, alongside allegations that dogs have been transported there from populated areas.
On 15 September, the Jordan Times reported details from Jordan’s National Centre for Human Rights annual report. Jordan recorded 9,586 dog-bite cases during 2025, compared with 9,345 in 2024, and authorities are responding with a national plan for the country’s free-roaming dog population.
The plan includes a central database and 19 shelters. A tender for a shelter in Karak has already been awarded and construction is under way. The National Centre for Human Rights has also called for expanded vaccination and sterilisation programmes.
Earlier this year, the Ministry of Local Administration described a system in which trained municipal workers would capture dogs and take them to contracted veterinary clinics. There they would be examined, identified, vaccinated against rabies and sterilised. Healthy dogs would then be returned to the areas from which they had been captured.
That makes events in Safawi particularly important.
Safawi lies in Mafraq Governorate in north-eastern Jordan. On 8 September, OIPA International said it had contacted Jordanian authorities after receiving information about large numbers of dogs living across remote desert areas there.
OIPA said it had cross-checked videos, testimony and information from multiple local sources and animal-welfare organisations. It described a significant, although currently unquantifiable, dog population living with extremely limited access to food, water and veterinary care.
It also reported receiving information suggesting that dogs may have been removed from urban and residential areas and transported to remote locations.
Then, on 24 September, Network for Animals published an emergency appeal estimating that at least 4,000 dogs and puppies were living in the desert. It alleges that animals were dumped there without adequate food or water, while local volunteers are trying to keep them alive.
The figure and the allegation of deliberate dumping have not been independently established, and there is currently no official confirmation that Jordanian authorities transported the dogs.
But there is an obvious question. How did so many dogs come to be living in the Safawi desert?
If dogs have been transported there from towns and residential areas, it needs to be established who moved them, where they came from and what provision was made for their welfare.
That answer is particularly important because it could reveal a significant gap between Jordan’s stated national policy and what is happening on the ground.
The country’s planned shelters also need watching as the programme develops. Their significance will depend on how they are actually used: as temporary facilities supporting treatment, sterilisation and return, as centres for rehabilitation and adoption, or for longer-term confinement.
Capacity will matter too. So will what happens when facilities become full and what policies govern dogs that cannot be returned or rehomed.
The country’s national programme contains several important elements of sustainable dog-population management, including sterilisation, vaccination, identification and coordinated planning. There is currently insufficient evidence to describe it as a mass-removal programme.
But Safawi requires answers. Thousands of dogs are reported to be living in an environment where their basic needs are difficult to meet, while questions remain about whether some were transported there from populated areas.
Jordan is building a new national system for its stray dogs. Understanding how the dogs of Safawi came to be in the desert must now be part of assessing how that system is working.