A U.S. animal foundation asked me to arrange an interview with a dog slaughterhouse in China for their documentary.  After research, I took them to a market in Jiangmen. When we were there, it’s astonishing to see far more than we expected!  This is not just a market for cats and dogs.  Over a hundred different animals you can buy here, like crocodile, turtle, porcupine, snakes, deer, etc.  They even slaughter the animal in front of you and you can take it home for your meals.

The crocodile stall owner told me the crocodiles are fed in a pool, not the wild.  But I think most of the others are wild animals.

We interviewed a woman who has opened the stall selling cats and dogs over 10 years.  She told us the cats and dogs are from local and other provinces.  Sometimes, the pet owners may take their cats and dogs here and sell them to her.  She can sell about 30 dogs and cats a day.  Her daughter also helped her kill the cats and dogs.

The law of protecting companion animals and wild animals doesn’t seem applicable here.  It’s  a great concern  if it’s safe to take these animals as food.  However,  people here just don’t care!

Many countries have the wild animals protection law.  People are forbidden to hunt the wild animals.  However, when there is demand, people would disregard the law for profit making.  Apart from legal constraint, we know little if wild animals are edible in view of health concern.  There is no quarantine for wild animals and they may have human transmittable diseases.  We ever experienced SARS and it’s origin is from swinhoe.  It is also known that people will contract leprosy if  people eat armadillo.  We can still found these cases in China and United States recently.

Urbanization has destroyed the natural environment and industrialization has polluted it.  Wild animals are being highly affected. They lose their homes and their food are polluted by chemicals with carcinogens and with poison.  Their health conditions could possibly endanger the humans, especially when people put them on the dining table.

OIPA China is leading an educational project in Chinese schools and universities, in order to raise awareness on animal issues and right. Read more about the project and support OIPA China: http://www.oipainternational.org/shelter-oipa-china/

Author: Simon KWOK Kam-fai, OIPA China

L'articolo Wild animals on dining table, SUPPORT OIPA PROJECT AND SAVE THE ANIMALS proviene da OIPA.

But, when wildlife is important for human beings?

There are many different reasons to assert the importance of wildlife in human life: first of all, the maintenance of wildlife means guarantying the “balance of nature”, and in consequence the natural cycles of life, the food chain… If lions disappeared, what would happen? Firstly, their natural pray (zebras, gazelles…) would increase in number, due to the absence of their principal predator. This raise in number would lead to a reduction of vegetable food, not just for the excess animal, but for all other herbivores (elephants, buffalos, giraffes, warthog, rhinos…). The absence of vegetable supply would kill all the herbivorous, and this would conduct to the death of carnivorous, too. In few years, the general and natural biodiversity would rapidly decrease, until reaching the total decease of all animals of that area. This reasoning can be developed not just for lions, but for all animals across the world.

Secondly, wildlife has an undeniable economic value: the flora provides to human beings many fundamental and helpful substances like timber, paper, natural gums… without considering all the herbs used for natural drugs. Fauna, instead, play an important role for tourism: many developing countries have more than 80% of their economies based on wildlife tourism (in particular safaris, to see wild animals in their natural habitat). If attractive wild animals such as lions, elephants, rhinos or giraffes died, who would go to poor places, such as Sub-Saharan inner cities? To do what? To visit what?

Thirdly, wildlife has an aesthetic value to human beings and it is part of their cultural assets… Animals have always had a privileged position in the human history and consequently in the history of art: since the beginning of the mankind, different masterpieces have involved animals and wildlife (or have them as the principal subject!): from the first rock paintings, where hunted animals were the main topic, up until nowadays when we cannot forget Picasso’s Guernica, where a horse and a bull are represented, suffering for the madness of few powerful humans.

Wildlife is actually and heritage of all humanity and as such it must be safeguarded and protected. Due to the interconnection between the ecological sphere, all animals need to be defended, from fish to birds to mammals. This protection is not just for the future generations of humans, that deserve to live in a world not disfigured by the current greed, but above all for all the animals themselves. Because they are the only one that understood that they are on the Earth for just the time of their life, while the Earth will remain here, for many more millennium. It is not anymore “sit tibi terra levis”: it must be us to be slight on the Earth.

OIPA has been fighting for wildlife since the beginning of its work, and over the year it began to specialize in the various sectors to ensure a greater impact. Anyway, it continues to regard the wildlife as a total that must be protected. For everyone.

See more: http://www.oipainternational.org/hunting/ and: http://www.oipainternational.org/stand-for-elephants/

L'articolo WILDLIFE – A TREASURE FOR THE WHOLE WORLD proviene da OIPA.