Chinese City Drafts Law to Ban Residents from Eating Dogs

A city in China has drafted a law to ban residents from eating dog meat to improve food safety in the wake of the novel coronavirus outbreak.

Animal activists have demanded the Chinese government prohibit the consumption of dogs for years. 

If this proposal from Shenzhen gets passed, it will be the first of its kind in the country.

People eat dog meat at a restaurant in Yulin on June 21, 2017

The annual Yulin Dog Meat Festival is one of the most controversial food festivals in China and sees thousands of dogs cruelly killed, skinned and cooked with blow-torches before being eaten by the locals.

Apart from dogs, the proposed act bars snake, frog and turtle meat from the dinner table.

The news comes after China banned all trade and consumption of wild animals, a practice believed responsible for the country's deadly virus epidemic.

Lawmakers from Shenzhen, a city of around 13 million people, published the proposal yesterday on its government's website.

They are currently waiting for feedback from the public before signing it into law.

The officials described the regulation as the 'universal civilisation requirement of a modern society'.

They said they had considered the city's practical situation before including the extra animal species, which are not wildlife. The aim is to 'further satisfy the daily needs of the people'.

According to the document, nine types of livestock are suitable for people to eat. They are pigs, cows, sheep, donkeys, rabbits, chickens, ducks, geese and pigeons.

Residents are also allowed to dine on aquatic animals permitted by law.

Commenting on the necessity for the government to create 'a white list', one spokesperson said the authority wanted to make it easier for people to know what can be eaten.

'There are so many animal species in nature. In our country alone, there are more than 2,000 kinds of protected wild animal species.

'If the local authority is to produce a list of the wild animals that cannot be eaten, it will be too lengthy and cannot answer the question exactly what animals can be eaten,' the official said.

China's top legislative committee on Monday passed new legislation to ban all trade and consumption of wild animals.

Beijing is yet to revise its wild animal protection law, but the passage of the proposal was 'essential' and 'urgent' in helping China win its war against the epidemic, wrote state newspaper People's Daily.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk

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