FOOD and MEDICINE ANIMALS
Please also visit the Vegetarian Page and Endangered Animals. If you don't find what you are looking for on one page, try the other. Or use the Search button on the Home Page.
See: Endangered Animals
CATS - let's not get into cats. The China food-cat trade is too horrible.
Terrible scenes can be witnessed in most cities if you know where to look, especially in the South.
"The Ching Ping market in Guangzhou is a real vision of hell - a Dante's inferno of animals. Barking deer and wild boars crammed in cages with legs broken from the trap and hopeless fear in their eyes. coypus, turtles, snakes, cats crammed in cages being moved into another cage by being jabbed with metal spikes, dogs struggling inside sacks waiting for their turn to be displayed, hens in piles with the underneath ones already suffocated - hundreds of species suffering horrendously before one's eyes at the hands of humanity. All kinds of animals (from cats and dogs to poultry to civet cats to pangolins to you name it it's there) wounded and dying with broken limbs and guts hanging out, lying in heaps or being prodded with barbecue forks from place to place. Also plenty of bear gallbladders, tiger penises, bear paws, etc. - all on open display all day and every day. The hawkers know what they are doing is illegal and try to avoid being photographed - the surrounding crowd is supportive of the hawkers."
Ching Ping was cleaned up and most of its functions are now at the Zencha Road Chatou Poultry and Livestock Wholesale Market. There are still dreadful things to see but most of the illegalities are out of sight.Cat Food (warning - graphic pictures, not for the faint-hearted)
Cat Abuse in Asia
Terrible scenes can be witnessed in most cities if you know where to look, especially in the South.
"The Ching Ping market in Guangzhou is a real vision of hell - a Dante's inferno of animals. Barking deer and wild boars crammed in cages with legs broken from the trap and hopeless fear in their eyes. coypus, turtles, snakes, cats crammed in cages being moved into another cage by being jabbed with metal spikes, dogs struggling inside sacks waiting for their turn to be displayed, hens in piles with the underneath ones already suffocated - hundreds of species suffering horrendously before one's eyes at the hands of humanity. All kinds of animals (from cats and dogs to poultry to civet cats to pangolins to you name it it's there) wounded and dying with broken limbs and guts hanging out, lying in heaps or being prodded with barbecue forks from place to place. Also plenty of bear gallbladders, tiger penises, bear paws, etc. - all on open display all day and every day. The hawkers know what they are doing is illegal and try to avoid being photographed - the surrounding crowd is supportive of the hawkers."
Ching Ping was cleaned up and most of its functions are now at the Zencha Road Chatou Poultry and Livestock Wholesale Market. There are still dreadful things to see but most of the illegalities are out of sight.Cat Food (warning - graphic pictures, not for the faint-hearted)
Cat Abuse in Asia
Doctors sometimes keep cages of cats for selling to patients to make "healing" soups.
CHINCHILLASClick the picture:
CIVETS
COWSClick on these cows:
CROCODILES
- As most of the 21 species of crocodiles are now endangered, farms now breed them for their meat and skins.
- These farms keep crocodiles in often unnatural, overcrowded conditions.
- Some of these farms even promote themselves as tourist attractions and attempt to cultivate an educational image.
- The killing methods used are by stabbing the neck to severe the spinal cord.
- This only immobilises the animal, but leaves it fully conscious.
- The crocodile is virtually skinned alive.
What YOU Can Do
- Avoid buying shoes, bags, wallets and other products made from crocodile skin.
- Share your knowledge about the industry that exploits crocodiles with your friends.
- Avoid eating crocodile meat.
- DOGS
If you are of a squeamish disposition and have already decided that you are against eating meat, please don't view the dog pages.
Please be warned that some of the scenes photographed are horrific.
To enter the food-dog pages, click on this picture of a chef preparing dog meat in Vietnam:
For more on FISH and FISHING - click on the Starfish:
see also "Sharks" below
OSTRICHES
See: Ostriches/Emus
See: Ostriches/Emus
Piglets kicked into a pit and buried alive during a foot and mouth outbreak in Korea:
[Acknowledgements to Reuters for photograph - May 2002]
[Acknowledgements to Reuters for photograph - May 2002]
Hanoi Hens:
Peking Duck. Minimum cage size?
(photo courtesy of SCMP)
Peking Duck. Minimum cage size?
(photo courtesy of SCMP)
(photo courtesy of Medical Tribune)Ducks in Korea being buried alive. (Reuters).
China Daily July 2000:
Chinese companies will open the largest facility of foie-gras in the world. The biggest plant in the world of foie-gras, a typically French specialty, will be constructed in southwest China, revealed this Friday by the China News Agency.
The farm, that will produce a thousand tons of pate per year, worth US$3 million, will be ready in four years near the region of Guangxi, which is one of the main producing regions of geese in China. The annual demand for the product was evaluated by the Xinhua Agency in the tens of thousand tons. Two Chinese companies are associated in order to finance this project.
Photo credit
RABBITS
"We were in Qing Ping the other day and saw, amongst others, the most ghastly thing - rabbits literally stripped of their fur (after being plunged into boiling water) and "sitting" on the table still alive." Jill Robinson at Qing Ping Market, Guangzhou, February 1998.
Still living skinned rabbit in Lowu Market, South China:
Rabbits being fattened in the ladies' toilet in Chengdu:
"What the rabbit saw...."
Still living skinned rabbit in Lowu Market, South China:
Rabbits being fattened in the ladies' toilet in Chengdu:
"What the rabbit saw...."
SHARKS
High demand for shark fin soup in Asia has led to some particularly repugnant fishing practices. Horror Gallery
TURKEYS See: TURKEYS
TURTLE TORTURE
- Turtles are primarily captured for their shells or for consumption.
- When turtles are caught, their flippers are pierced and sewed together with wire threads so they cannot escape.
- Their eyes may also be sheared with hot iron rods.
- During slaughter, their body is sometimes simply scooped from the shell with a knife, sometimes without any attempt to kill the animal first.
- In countries where the shell is more valuable, the shells are torn from the living body at the place of capture.
- Turtle and tortoise shells are made into items like spectacle frames, cigarette cases, hair brushes, combs and other decorative items.
- Many species of turtles and tortoises are endangered.
What YOU Can Do
- Note that "innocent" items such as spectacle frames and hair brushes can be made from turtle and tortoise shell. Ask the salesperson what the product you have selected is made of.
- Politely explain why you do not buy products made from turtles and tortoises or other animal products. Your comments will act as good feedback on the rise in the trend of caring consumers like you who bring ethics to the department store. If more consumers make such comments about their preferences, businesses might bring in cruelty-free ranges of products.
VEAL involves especial cruelty.
Click on both these pictures:
WHALES
SLAUGHTERHOUSES
In the East you can see the horror of slaughter on the streets. In the West it goes on well hidden behind high walls.
A good book on this subject is SLAUGHTERHOUSE: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry, written by Gail A. Eisnitz and published by Prometheus Books. SLAUGHTERHOUSE is a gripping, horrifying page-turner of a book based on Eisnitz's tenacious investigation with extensive interviews with current and former slaughterhouse workers and disgusted USDA inspectors. She tells a story of unbelievable cruelty and corruption that begins with her investigation of a single meatpacking plant where somebody informs her about animals bled, skinned, and dismembered alive (a common industry practice, as the book demonstrates). As her investigation proceeds and more people come forward to testify, she traces the ever-widening circles of cruelty and corruption to the highest levels of government. The book is only available in hardcover ($29.95), but it can be ordered at a 30% discount from Amazon.com
Slaughterhouse by Gail A Eisnitz - Prometheus Books, New York, 1997; 310 pp; $29.95 hc
Review by Alex Hershaft, PhD, President, FARM
In the midst of our high-tech, ostentatious, hedonistic lifestyle, among the dazzling monuments to history, art, religion, and commerce, there are the 'black boxes.' These are the biomedical research laboratories, factory farms, and slaughterhouses -- faceless compounds where society conducts its dirty business of abusing and killing innocent, feeling beings. These are our Dachaus, our Buchenwalds, our Birkenaus. Like the good German burgers, we have a fair idea of what goes on there, but we don't want any reality checks. We rationalize that the killing has to be done and that it's done humanely. We fear that the truth would offend our sensibilities and perhaps force us to do something. It may even change our life.
Slaughterhouse by Gail Eisnitz of the Humane Farming Association is a gut-wrenching, chilling, yet carefully documented, expose of unspeakable torture and death in America's slaughterhouses. It explodes their popular image of obscure factories that turn dumb 'livestock' into sterile, cellophane-wrapped 'food' in the meat display case. The testimony of dozens of slaughterhouse workers and USDA inspectors pulls the curtain on abominable hellholes, where the last minutes of innocent, feeling, intelligent horses, cows, calves, pigs, and chickens are turned into interminable agony. And, yes, the book may well change your life. Here are some sample quotes (warning! extremely offensive material follows). The agony starts when the animals are hauled over long distances under extreme crowding and harsh temperatures. Here is an account from a worker assigned to unloading pigs "In the winter, some hogs come in all froze to the sides of the trucks. They tie a chain around them and jerk them off the walls of the truck, leave a chunk of hide and flesh behind. They might have a little bit of life left in them, but workers just throw them on the piles of dead ones. They'll die sooner or later." Once at the slaughterhouse, some animals are too injured to walk and others simply refuse to go quietly to their deaths. This is how the workers deal with it "The preferred method of handling a cripple is to beat him to death with a lead pipe before he gets into the chute... If you get a hog in a chute that's had the shit prodded out of him, and has a heart attack or refuses to move, you take a meat hook and hook it into his bunghole (anus)...and a lot of times the meat hook rips out of the bunghole. I've seen thighs completely ripped open. I've also seen intestines come out." And here is what awaits the animals on the kill floor. First, the testimony of a horse slaughterhouse worker "You move so fast you don't have time to wait till a horse bleeds out. You skin him as he bleeds. Sometimes a horse's nose is down in the blood, blowing bubbles, and he suffocates."
Then another worker, on cow slaughter "A lot of times the skinner finds a cow is still conscious when he slices the side of its head and it starts kicking wildly. If that happens, ... the skinner shoves a knife into the back of its head to cut the spinal cord." (This paralyzes the animal, but doesn't stop the pain of being skinned alive.) And still another, on calf slaughter "To get done with them faster, we'd put eight or nine of them in the knocking box at a time... You start shooting, the calves are jumping, they're all piling up on top of each other. You don't know which ones got shot and which didn't... They're hung anyway, and down the line they go, wriggling and yelling" (to be slaughtered while fully conscious). And on pig slaughter "If the hog is conscious, ... it takes a long time for him to bleed out. These hogs get up to the scalding tank, hit the water, and start kicking and screaming... There's a rotating arm that pushes them under. No chance for them to get out. I am not sure if they burn to death before they drown, but it takes them a couple of minutes to stop thrashing."
The work takes a major emotional toll on the workers. Here's one worker's account "I've taken out my job pressure and frustration on the animals, on my wife, ... and on myself, with heavy drink-ing." Then it gets a lot worse "... with an animal who pisses you off, you don't just kill it. You ... blow the windpipe, make it drown in its own blood, split its nose... I would cut its eye out... and this hog would just scream. One time I ... sliced off the end of a hog's nose. The hog went crazy, so I took a handful of salt brine and ground it into his nose. Now that hog really went nuts..."
Safety is a major problem for workers who operate sharp instruments standing on a floor slippery with blood and gore, surrounded by conscious animals kicking for their lives, and pressed by a speeding slaughter line. Indeed, 36 percent incur serious injuries, making their work the most hazardous in America. Workers who are disabled and those who complain about working conditions are fired and frequently replaced by undocumented aliens. A few years ago, 25 workers were burned to death in a chicken slaughterhouse fire in Hamlet, NC, because management had locked the safety doors to prevent theft. Here is a worker's account "The conditions are very dangerous, and workers aren't well trained for the machinery. One machine has a whirring blade that catches people in it. Workers lose fingers. One woman's breast got caught in it and was torn off. Another's shirt got caught and her face was dragged into it." Although Slaughterhouse focuses on animal cruelty and worker safety, it also addresses the issues of consumer health, including the failure of the federal inspection system. There is a poignant testimony from the mother of a child who ate a hamburger contaminated with E. coli "After Brianne's second emergency surgery, surgeons left her open from her sternum to her pubic area to allow her swollen organs room to expand and prevent them from ripping her skin... Her heart ... bled from every pore. The toxins shut down Brianne's liver and pancreas. An insulin pump was started. Several times her skin turned black for weeks. She had a brain swell that the neurologists could not treat... They told us that Brianne was essentially brain-dead."
Slaughterhouse has some problems. In an attempt to reflect the timeline of the investigation, the presentation suffers from poor organization and considerable redundancy. But that's a bit like criticizing the testimony on my Holocaust experiences because of my Polish accent. The major problem is not with the content of the book, but with the publisher's cover design. The title and the headless carcasses pictured on the dust jacket effectively ensure that the book will not be read widely and that the shocking testimony inside will not get out to the consuming public. And that's a pity. Because the countless animals whose agony the book documents so graphically deserve to have their story told. And because Slaughterhouse is the most powerful argument for meatless eating that I have ever read. Eisnitz' closing comment "Now you know, and you can help end these atrocities" should be fair warning. After nearly 25 years of work on farm animal issues, including leading several slaughterhouse demonstrations, I was deeply affected. Indeed, reading Slaughterhouse has changed my life.
Slaughterhouse by Gail A Eisnitz - Prometheus Books, New York, 1997; 310 pp; $29.95 hc
Review by Alex Hershaft, PhD, President, FARM
In the midst of our high-tech, ostentatious, hedonistic lifestyle, among the dazzling monuments to history, art, religion, and commerce, there are the 'black boxes.' These are the biomedical research laboratories, factory farms, and slaughterhouses -- faceless compounds where society conducts its dirty business of abusing and killing innocent, feeling beings. These are our Dachaus, our Buchenwalds, our Birkenaus. Like the good German burgers, we have a fair idea of what goes on there, but we don't want any reality checks. We rationalize that the killing has to be done and that it's done humanely. We fear that the truth would offend our sensibilities and perhaps force us to do something. It may even change our life.
Slaughterhouse by Gail Eisnitz of the Humane Farming Association is a gut-wrenching, chilling, yet carefully documented, expose of unspeakable torture and death in America's slaughterhouses. It explodes their popular image of obscure factories that turn dumb 'livestock' into sterile, cellophane-wrapped 'food' in the meat display case. The testimony of dozens of slaughterhouse workers and USDA inspectors pulls the curtain on abominable hellholes, where the last minutes of innocent, feeling, intelligent horses, cows, calves, pigs, and chickens are turned into interminable agony. And, yes, the book may well change your life. Here are some sample quotes (warning! extremely offensive material follows). The agony starts when the animals are hauled over long distances under extreme crowding and harsh temperatures. Here is an account from a worker assigned to unloading pigs "In the winter, some hogs come in all froze to the sides of the trucks. They tie a chain around them and jerk them off the walls of the truck, leave a chunk of hide and flesh behind. They might have a little bit of life left in them, but workers just throw them on the piles of dead ones. They'll die sooner or later." Once at the slaughterhouse, some animals are too injured to walk and others simply refuse to go quietly to their deaths. This is how the workers deal with it "The preferred method of handling a cripple is to beat him to death with a lead pipe before he gets into the chute... If you get a hog in a chute that's had the shit prodded out of him, and has a heart attack or refuses to move, you take a meat hook and hook it into his bunghole (anus)...and a lot of times the meat hook rips out of the bunghole. I've seen thighs completely ripped open. I've also seen intestines come out." And here is what awaits the animals on the kill floor. First, the testimony of a horse slaughterhouse worker "You move so fast you don't have time to wait till a horse bleeds out. You skin him as he bleeds. Sometimes a horse's nose is down in the blood, blowing bubbles, and he suffocates."
Then another worker, on cow slaughter "A lot of times the skinner finds a cow is still conscious when he slices the side of its head and it starts kicking wildly. If that happens, ... the skinner shoves a knife into the back of its head to cut the spinal cord." (This paralyzes the animal, but doesn't stop the pain of being skinned alive.) And still another, on calf slaughter "To get done with them faster, we'd put eight or nine of them in the knocking box at a time... You start shooting, the calves are jumping, they're all piling up on top of each other. You don't know which ones got shot and which didn't... They're hung anyway, and down the line they go, wriggling and yelling" (to be slaughtered while fully conscious). And on pig slaughter "If the hog is conscious, ... it takes a long time for him to bleed out. These hogs get up to the scalding tank, hit the water, and start kicking and screaming... There's a rotating arm that pushes them under. No chance for them to get out. I am not sure if they burn to death before they drown, but it takes them a couple of minutes to stop thrashing."
The work takes a major emotional toll on the workers. Here's one worker's account "I've taken out my job pressure and frustration on the animals, on my wife, ... and on myself, with heavy drink-ing." Then it gets a lot worse "... with an animal who pisses you off, you don't just kill it. You ... blow the windpipe, make it drown in its own blood, split its nose... I would cut its eye out... and this hog would just scream. One time I ... sliced off the end of a hog's nose. The hog went crazy, so I took a handful of salt brine and ground it into his nose. Now that hog really went nuts..."
Safety is a major problem for workers who operate sharp instruments standing on a floor slippery with blood and gore, surrounded by conscious animals kicking for their lives, and pressed by a speeding slaughter line. Indeed, 36 percent incur serious injuries, making their work the most hazardous in America. Workers who are disabled and those who complain about working conditions are fired and frequently replaced by undocumented aliens. A few years ago, 25 workers were burned to death in a chicken slaughterhouse fire in Hamlet, NC, because management had locked the safety doors to prevent theft. Here is a worker's account "The conditions are very dangerous, and workers aren't well trained for the machinery. One machine has a whirring blade that catches people in it. Workers lose fingers. One woman's breast got caught in it and was torn off. Another's shirt got caught and her face was dragged into it." Although Slaughterhouse focuses on animal cruelty and worker safety, it also addresses the issues of consumer health, including the failure of the federal inspection system. There is a poignant testimony from the mother of a child who ate a hamburger contaminated with E. coli "After Brianne's second emergency surgery, surgeons left her open from her sternum to her pubic area to allow her swollen organs room to expand and prevent them from ripping her skin... Her heart ... bled from every pore. The toxins shut down Brianne's liver and pancreas. An insulin pump was started. Several times her skin turned black for weeks. She had a brain swell that the neurologists could not treat... They told us that Brianne was essentially brain-dead."
Slaughterhouse has some problems. In an attempt to reflect the timeline of the investigation, the presentation suffers from poor organization and considerable redundancy. But that's a bit like criticizing the testimony on my Holocaust experiences because of my Polish accent. The major problem is not with the content of the book, but with the publisher's cover design. The title and the headless carcasses pictured on the dust jacket effectively ensure that the book will not be read widely and that the shocking testimony inside will not get out to the consuming public. And that's a pity. Because the countless animals whose agony the book documents so graphically deserve to have their story told. And because Slaughterhouse is the most powerful argument for meatless eating that I have ever read. Eisnitz' closing comment "Now you know, and you can help end these atrocities" should be fair warning. After nearly 25 years of work on farm animal issues, including leading several slaughterhouse demonstrations, I was deeply affected. Indeed, reading Slaughterhouse has changed my life.
Slaughterhouse is available from FARM (PO Box 30654, Bethesda, MD20824), Humane Farming Association (PO Box 3577, San Rafael, CA 94912), and most bookstores. People who would like to help get this information to the general public should contact FARM and HFA.
The real answer here is a vegetarian diet - preferably vegan - but it is a fact that the vast majority of the population is going to remain carnivorous for the foreseeable future. Therefore we have to consider the strangely titled subject of Humane Slaughter. The Hong Kong Government has constructed a new central abattoir in Sheung Shui. The SPCA was not allowed to be involved in the planning of this. We hope the Government has taken all possible steps to minimise the suffering of the condemned animals.
No one has yet made a survey of Asian factory farming but the current plans for multi-storey farming send shivers down the spines of all with an interest in animal welfare.
We should do our best to reveal to the public the horrors of modern systems of meat, poultry, fish and egg production. Shark's fins, veal and foie gras involve especial suffering.
CLOTHING and COSMETIC ANIMALS
We believe that the use of animals for clothing can only be justified where there is no inanimate alternative source. In modern society this is never the case. The more unnecessary the clothing, the worse the violation of animals - that is to say, using leather is wrong but wearing fur is an outrage. Trapping, snaring, shooting, poisoning or any other molestation of wild animals is wrong. And captive breeding is every bit as bad. The fur industry tries to tell us that conditions on their farms are good. We say - go take a look! See also: Experiment Animals
For more detailed information on the cruelty involved in different clothing materials, click:
Footwear & Clothing
Footwear & Clothing
Where to buy cruelty free clothing, toiletries, household products, cleaning supplies and cosmetics:PETA's Companies that test and don't test (You can do a great deal for animals by following this guide!!)
Stuffed gibbon in a Beijing clothing shop:
(picture by IPPL)
(picture by IPPL)Fur?
The Fur Industry is moving in on China in the same way as the Tobacco Companies. These industries see a vast market of newly rich people who have little in the way of the education necessary to see the truth behind the advertisements. The increase in fur wearing in the winter in Chinese cities is all too apparent to even the casual observer. Hong Kong/China is now the largest exporter of fur garments to the U.S. For July 2000, Hong Kong shipped nearly US$6 million, up 174% - almost 40% of the total. For 2000, Hong Kong's cumulative total was $24.9 million, up 132%. Canada shipped $4.8 million, and a total of $23 million (up 21%) for the year. Italy shipped $2.9 million in July, up 81%. Their total for 2000 is $5.9 million, an increase of 88%. Shipments from Greece increased 2% to $671,000 in July. Greece shipped a total of $2.9 million (up 65%) in 2000.
Fox fur helps develop China's western provinces
Japan Economic Newswire June 13, 2000, Tuesday
Michael Forsythe - DATELINE: DINGXI, China June 13 Kyodo
Fox, reviled for centuries in Chinese folk tales, now occupies an increasingly important role in lifting China's more backward western provinces out of economic doldrums.
Chinese farmers hope to earn big profits selling fox pelts into the Russian and Chinese markets. Gansu Province's Dingxi County, one of China's poorest, is ground zero for the burgeoning fox fur industry.
Yang Shengsheng, sole proprietor of the 'Dry Area Special Plant and Animal Husbandry Corp.,' is the darling of local officials, who are anxious to stimulate the rural county's economy.
But Yang's 3,000 foxes live in conditions that would make any animal rights activist bristle.
Kept in cages arranged in rows inside Yang's walled compound, the animals are fully exposed to the summer heat of the near-desert environment. They also appeared underfed and one was seen eating its own feces, an act Yang was at a loss to explain.
But in a county where rural incomes average 1,188 yuan (US$143) a year, less than one-fifth of China's average, the prospects of earning up to 1,300 yuan per fox pelt has sent Yang dreaming big.
'This year, I expect to sell 10,000 pelts,' Yang says.
But the question of how 3,000 caged animals can net 10,000 pelts provides the key to understanding why Dingxi's officials are so intrigued by Yang's project.
Yang subcontracts fox breeding to local peasants, who buy breeding pairs from his company at about 1,000 yuan each. The mature foxes cost about 700 yuan annually to feed, but can yield up to 20 pups each. Farmers then sell the offspring back to Yang, who in turn sells them to a wholesaler. In short, fox farming provides an attractive alternative to growing crops, a difficult task in barely arable Dingxi, which has an average of just 350 millimeters of rain annually.
So far, 27 peasant families are participating in the breeding program, but Yang hopes the number will multiply because China's fur industry has room to grow.
Despite the prominence of animal rights organizations in Europe, Japan and North America, the developed world still harvests the lion's share of fox pelts. Scandinavian countries lead the pack, with Finland, which in 1998 harvested 2,700,000 pelts, accounting for more than half the world's fox-fur output. Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Sweden round out the top five. China, harvesting 200,000 pelts per year, has less than 5% of the world market, according to statistics from the Finnish Fur Breeders Association.
Luckily for Yang and his fellow furriers, the necessities of economic development in China's impoverished western regions and the weakness of animal rights groups in China have kept the pressure off the nascent industry.
Outside China, scores of organizations such as the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) keep the fox fur industry on tenterhooks. And the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) calls for a ban on fox farming, citing the animals' unsuitability to caged life.
'Foxes are particularly unsuited for cage raising: they are extremely fearful of humans and generally anxious in the typical caging environment. They tremble, defecate, and withdraw to the back of their cages,' the HSUS Website notes.
Chinese foxes have reason to be especially fearful of humans. Centuries of Chinese and Japanese folk tales have painted foxes as the embodiment of evil. According to legend, fox spirits transform themselves into beautiful women and seduce unknowing men, stealing their qi (spiritual essence) in the process. As a result, few tears are shed when the foxes are harvested.
Instead, the region's leaders are anxious to develop the area's economy, and Yang's fox farm has been singled out as an example of a promising emerging industry.
Provincial officials authored a leaflet proclaiming his firm is 'making an important contribution to the farmers of Dingxi and the surrounding area who rely on agriculture to escape from poverty and become rich.'
Yang's fox farm has taken on even more prominence since last December when the central government in Beijing earmarked Gansu Province and its western neighbors in a massive, multi-billion dollar program to ease the chronic income disparity between the bustling eastern coast and the arid west. And Yang is answering the clarion call. He is expanding into wolf meat, and, in what could be a first for the landlocked province - crab and shrimp farming.
Michael Forsythe - DATELINE: DINGXI, China June 13 Kyodo
Fox, reviled for centuries in Chinese folk tales, now occupies an increasingly important role in lifting China's more backward western provinces out of economic doldrums.
Chinese farmers hope to earn big profits selling fox pelts into the Russian and Chinese markets. Gansu Province's Dingxi County, one of China's poorest, is ground zero for the burgeoning fox fur industry.
Yang Shengsheng, sole proprietor of the 'Dry Area Special Plant and Animal Husbandry Corp.,' is the darling of local officials, who are anxious to stimulate the rural county's economy.
But Yang's 3,000 foxes live in conditions that would make any animal rights activist bristle.
Kept in cages arranged in rows inside Yang's walled compound, the animals are fully exposed to the summer heat of the near-desert environment. They also appeared underfed and one was seen eating its own feces, an act Yang was at a loss to explain.
But in a county where rural incomes average 1,188 yuan (US$143) a year, less than one-fifth of China's average, the prospects of earning up to 1,300 yuan per fox pelt has sent Yang dreaming big.
'This year, I expect to sell 10,000 pelts,' Yang says.
But the question of how 3,000 caged animals can net 10,000 pelts provides the key to understanding why Dingxi's officials are so intrigued by Yang's project.
Yang subcontracts fox breeding to local peasants, who buy breeding pairs from his company at about 1,000 yuan each. The mature foxes cost about 700 yuan annually to feed, but can yield up to 20 pups each. Farmers then sell the offspring back to Yang, who in turn sells them to a wholesaler. In short, fox farming provides an attractive alternative to growing crops, a difficult task in barely arable Dingxi, which has an average of just 350 millimeters of rain annually.
So far, 27 peasant families are participating in the breeding program, but Yang hopes the number will multiply because China's fur industry has room to grow.
Despite the prominence of animal rights organizations in Europe, Japan and North America, the developed world still harvests the lion's share of fox pelts. Scandinavian countries lead the pack, with Finland, which in 1998 harvested 2,700,000 pelts, accounting for more than half the world's fox-fur output. Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Sweden round out the top five. China, harvesting 200,000 pelts per year, has less than 5% of the world market, according to statistics from the Finnish Fur Breeders Association.
Luckily for Yang and his fellow furriers, the necessities of economic development in China's impoverished western regions and the weakness of animal rights groups in China have kept the pressure off the nascent industry.
Outside China, scores of organizations such as the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) keep the fox fur industry on tenterhooks. And the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) calls for a ban on fox farming, citing the animals' unsuitability to caged life.
'Foxes are particularly unsuited for cage raising: they are extremely fearful of humans and generally anxious in the typical caging environment. They tremble, defecate, and withdraw to the back of their cages,' the HSUS Website notes.
Chinese foxes have reason to be especially fearful of humans. Centuries of Chinese and Japanese folk tales have painted foxes as the embodiment of evil. According to legend, fox spirits transform themselves into beautiful women and seduce unknowing men, stealing their qi (spiritual essence) in the process. As a result, few tears are shed when the foxes are harvested.
Instead, the region's leaders are anxious to develop the area's economy, and Yang's fox farm has been singled out as an example of a promising emerging industry.
Provincial officials authored a leaflet proclaiming his firm is 'making an important contribution to the farmers of Dingxi and the surrounding area who rely on agriculture to escape from poverty and become rich.'
Yang's fox farm has taken on even more prominence since last December when the central government in Beijing earmarked Gansu Province and its western neighbors in a massive, multi-billion dollar program to ease the chronic income disparity between the bustling eastern coast and the arid west. And Yang is answering the clarion call. He is expanding into wolf meat, and, in what could be a first for the landlocked province - crab and shrimp farming.
One sixth of a fox fur jacket:
Down?
"Down" is the soft under-feathering often plucked out of live geese who are raised for food. In many European countries, geese are allowed to mature during the first eight or nine weeks of life. Reaching adulthood, they are divided by color. Gray geese are caged and force-fed - a funnel is inserted into their throats and a salty, fatty corn mash is forced down it, up to six pounds a day - until they are overweight and their livers have ballooned to four or more times the normal size. Then they are killed for pate de foie gras.(1)
White geese are plucked repeatedly to supply filling for products such as comforters, pillows, and ski parkas.(2)
Plucking the geese causes them considerable pain and distress. Four or five times in their lives, they will squirm as a plucker tears out five ounces of their feathers. A skilled plucker can handle 100 birds a day. After the last plucking, the geese have five weeks to grow more feathers before they are sent through a machine that plucks their longest feathers. From there they go to the slaughterhouse.(3)
In North America, ducks and geese are hunted and raised for their feathers (and for food). People also gather eider down from the nests of female eider ducks, who pluck the down from their breasts to line their nests and cover their eggs. Gathering the soft feathers can kill unhatched ducklings.(4)
Apart from the cruelty involved in its production, down has drawbacks as a cold-weather insulator that synthetic insulators do not have. Not only is down expensive, it also loses its insulating ability when wet, whereas the insulating capabilities of cruelty-free synthetic fillers are retained in all weather.(5)
References:
1. "And a Cow Jumped Over the Moon," The Animals' Voice, February 1989, p. 56.
2. Kamm, Henry, "No Bed of Feathers for a Goose in Hungary," The New York Times, June 2, 1988.
3. Ibid.
4. Pearson, Marcia, "Down," The Compassionate Shopper, Winter 1987-88.
5. Schneider, Al, "Down-Filled Clothing vs. Synthetics," Letters, The Washington Post Health Section, Jan. 16, 1990.
White geese are plucked repeatedly to supply filling for products such as comforters, pillows, and ski parkas.(2)
Plucking the geese causes them considerable pain and distress. Four or five times in their lives, they will squirm as a plucker tears out five ounces of their feathers. A skilled plucker can handle 100 birds a day. After the last plucking, the geese have five weeks to grow more feathers before they are sent through a machine that plucks their longest feathers. From there they go to the slaughterhouse.(3)
In North America, ducks and geese are hunted and raised for their feathers (and for food). People also gather eider down from the nests of female eider ducks, who pluck the down from their breasts to line their nests and cover their eggs. Gathering the soft feathers can kill unhatched ducklings.(4)
Apart from the cruelty involved in its production, down has drawbacks as a cold-weather insulator that synthetic insulators do not have. Not only is down expensive, it also loses its insulating ability when wet, whereas the insulating capabilities of cruelty-free synthetic fillers are retained in all weather.(5)
References:
1. "And a Cow Jumped Over the Moon," The Animals' Voice, February 1989, p. 56.
2. Kamm, Henry, "No Bed of Feathers for a Goose in Hungary," The New York Times, June 2, 1988.
3. Ibid.
4. Pearson, Marcia, "Down," The Compassionate Shopper, Winter 1987-88.
5. Schneider, Al, "Down-Filled Clothing vs. Synthetics," Letters, The Washington Post Health Section, Jan. 16, 1990.
Silk is the fibre silkworms weave to make cocoons. To obtain the silk, silk distributors boil the worms alive in their cocoons. Worms are sensate - they produce endorphins, a physical response to pain - and anyone who has seen worms scramble when their dark homes are uncovered recognizes this. Humane alternatives to silk include nylon, milkweed seed pod fibers, silk-cotton tree and ceiba tree filaments, and rayon.
Why Silk isn't so Smooth:
The two Martians, Tiker and Heblot were eagerly poring over the Earthling newspaper.
"What are these pests up to now?", sail Tiker, trying to look as uninterested as he could, but dying to get information.
"Har Har, I must say these earthlings are full of fads. Listen to this.
"Many earthlings are switching over to a 'vegetarian lifestyle'," guffawed Heblot.
"Now what on earth is that?" asked Tiker.
"Oh it is no big deal. Vegetarianism means staying away from the consumption of meat," said Heblot.
"Is that it?" sneered Tiker, disappointed.
"Yeah, that's what vegetarianism is. But a vegetarian lifestyle means staying away from fur, leather, pearls and other animal products.
But...," Heblot's voice trailed off as took out a shining lengthy piece of cloth from his bag. An evil, all-knowing grin appeared on his face, "Ha Ha Ha. These earthlings are too dumb, I tell you."
"But what? Tell me quickly. Are you telling me these humans are doing something foolish again?"
"You gotcha! They always goof up."
"Tell me how. I am all ears."
"These earthlings, idiots as they are, will stay away only from the "obviously" animal products. Yet, all products that are animal-free in content are not necessarily also cruelty-free. Like this piece of cloth."
He held out the dazzling long piece that he had pulled out.
"Wow!" said Tiker admiring the glistening, shimmering threads, "What heavenly thing is this? It shines like the sun."
"It is what they call silk, and what I have in my hand is a saree."
"But what has this got to do with animals or vegetarian lifestyles?"
"That's what is wrong with earthlings. Because it isn't covered with blood and gore, they can't see the cruelty in it. When they unthinkingly buy silk, they are causing pain and death."
"Now you don't prolong my agony, by withholding the crucial facts."
"OK, OK, let me explain. The filament of silk is what a silkworm spins its cocoon out of and is constructed as a shell to protect itself during its cycle of growth from caterpillar to chrysalis to moth. The female moth lays about 400 to 600 eggs. The eggs hatch in about 10 days and the larvae (one-twelfth of an inch in length) emerge. They feed on mulberry leaves for about 20-27 days, till they are fully grown (3-3 1/2 inches in length). A fully-grown caterpillar emits a gummy substance from its mouth and wraps itself in layers of this filament to form a cocoon in two to four days. The caterpillar develops into a moth in about 15 days. To emerge, it has to cut through the cocoon - thereby ruining the filament of the cocoon. Hence to save the filament from being damaged, the cocoon is either immersed in boiling water, passed through hot air or exposed to the scorching heat of the sun's rays to kill the lives inside. The long continuous filament of the cocoon is then reeled. To produce 100 grams of silk approximately 1,500 larvae have to die."
"You are actually telling me that to make one of these sarees at least 5000 insects are burnt or boiled to death. That must be some bloody boil," said Tiker, shuddering at the thought.
"Yes. Isn't it? And let me tell you more. Some larvae may be kept alive to allow the moths to emerge and mate. After a female moth lays eggs she is always crushed to check for diseases. If she appears diseased the eggs laid by her are immediately destroyed. Generation after generation of inbreeding has taken away the moth's capacity to fly. After mating, the male moths are dumped into a basket and thrown out. It is a common sight to see crows picking at them outside silk manufacturing units," said Heblot.
"Boy, that is cruel!" said Tiker.
"If that isn't enough cruelty, here's some more. There is another dimension to silk production - child labour. For generations, poor people of Kancheepuram (of the famed Kanjeevaram saris) in Tamil Nadu, have for a couple of thousand rupees mortgaged their 10-12-year-old children to the silk industry. Also, it has been reported that contractors in Jammu and Kashmir fleece farmers by purchasing silk at very low prices," completed Heblot.
"I don't believe earthlings can be this foolish. They are so foolish that all this doesn't seen funny any more. Has no human actually thought of stopping this?" asked a puzzled Tiker.
"Yes there are some people who are trying to create polyester fabrics in the market that look like silk, especially if they are printed in traditional designs and deep colours like purple, green and magenta. Some are even trying to make weavers able to weave polyester yarn on their looms so that they don't go out of jobs because people stop buying silk," answered Heblot.
" I knew earthlings were dumb, but this IS puzzling. Why on earth are people still buying silk?"
"Hah! That's where the earthlings lose out. Most are ignorant. There are many mild and gentle folk, who will not hurt a fly, but will not think twice about buying silk, because the cruelty connection isn't obvious. Those who are not, may chose to turn a blind eye to such facts. And you know why - silk makes them look good. They are vain creatures. They place a high premium on expensive clothes and good looks," said Heblot looking disgusted.
"So you are saying that they wouldn't mind thousands of creatures writhing in pain and getting scorched to death, if they can look good at a party, are you?" asked Tiker.
"Bingo!"
"Silk isn't all that smooth buddy! But catch the earthlings finding that out! Ha Ha!"
Suddenly it sounded funny again. Tiker and Heblot rolled on the ground with laughter.
Cosmetics?
A Cruelty-free Cosmetics Campaign was prepared in 1992 for the Hong Kong SPCA but was not put into effect because of lack of funds.
See top of the page for links to American and UK guides.
It would be wonderful if someone would come forward to produce a Cruelty Free Guide for Hong Kong (and other Asian regions!)
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