Animal disaster response in Latin America: Felipe Márquez

The couple has always loved animals. When Felipe Márquez and his wife, Ana Zavala, lived in a Toronto apartment that didn’t allow pets, they visited their local dog park to fill the pet-sized hole in their hearts. Then, when they moved to Mexico, they co-founded the nonprofit Amigos Pro Animal in 2009 to promote animal adoption and stronger animal welfare laws in the state of Aguascalientes.

A few years later, Humane World for Animals awarded the couple scholarships to attend our Animal Care Expo, the largest international educational conference for animal welfare professionals. There, Márquez learned our organization was opening a Mexico office.

In 2015, he joined as an animal cruelty program manager in Mexico. “That was the happiest moment in my professional life,” says Márquez. “My life changed absolutely for good.”

Márquez jumped right into the work. He had heard about an annual festival that had been going on for over 100 years: In a town on the Yucatan peninsula, people put animals inside piñatas and beat them to death. Márquez met with local authorities, cultural leaders and community members to convince them to transform the event into a cruelty-free celebration. The festival has now celebrated 10 years without harming animals.

Today, Márquez works as our Latin American disaster response program manager. He’s rescued animals around the world, such as those impacted by wildfires in Chile and earthquakes in Türkiye. “When you do what you love, what you are truly passionate about,” he says, “it can be hard to believe that it is actually work.”