The Rinderpest Serum Institute (Veba-i Bakari Seromu Dar-ül-istihzarı), considered as the beginning of today's Etlik Central Veterinary Control & Research Institute, used to operate in Eskisehir during the Turkish War of Independence, but then had to move to Ankara followed by Kirsehir/Bozkaya due to war.
After the Battle of Sakarya, our Institute changed its name to "Ankara Serum Production Institution" and moved to its current location in Etlik in December 1921, where it gave start to the production of rinderpest serum.
In 1927, the Institute started to produce Anthrax vaccine developed by Pasteur Institute and diphtheria vaccine for chicken, accompanied by research studies on animal diseases posing threat to national stockbreeding as well as serologic diagnosis of glanders the same year.
In 1928, production of vaccine against fowl cholera and typhus started making use of mallein and tuberculin.
In 1929, the production of BCG, tetanus, and glanders vaccines started, accompanied by diagnosis of rabies. The same year, laboratories were established in the fields of entomology, enology, and plant diseases.
In 1930, the laboratories engaged in agricultural issues were handed over to the School of Agriculture together with meteorological stations, with the institute entering a new phase of restructuring. Within the scope of this restructuring, a Research and Specialist Laboratory, a Food Control Laboratory, and an Animal Husbandry Laboratory were established.
After 1949, the Institute continued its growth even faster. In that year, Poultry Diseases and Parasitology Laboratories were opened followed by the FAO Central Brucellosis Laboratory in 1951, the Rabies and Sheep Pox Laboratories in 1953, and Serology Laboratory in 1954. Later on, the Leptospira Laboratory (1959), Research Laboratory (1963), and Pathology, Toxicology, and Viral Abortion Laboratories (1969) were opened.
During the course of time, certain topics had to be removed, while others were added according to scientific development and diversification of topics. Currently, our Institute is housing 7 departments and 21 laboratories in active operation.
As result of supervision and scope broadening inspections carried out by TURKAK within the scope of the TS EN ISO/IEC 17025 standard, which has been in application at our Institute since 2005, our Institute qualified to get accreditation for 70 topics and 160 analytes.
