Original Article: https://blog.theanimalrescuesite.greatergood.com/brazil-donkey-ban/

It’s not easy being a donkey, whose hard work is often rewarded with abuse, neglect, and exploitation.

Not only are donkeys overworked, underfed, and often forced to work in cruel conditions, now they’re also being slaughtered for their skins, which are used to make ejiao, a type of traditional Chinese medicine.

And unfortunately for donkeys, as well as everyone who depends on them for work and transportation, demand for ejiao is booming.

According to The Donkey Sanctuary, approximately 4.8 million donkey skins are used each year to make eijao, whose rampant production has caused China’s donkey population to fall 76 percent in only two decades.

Now China’s eijao producers are looking further afield for raw supplies, primarily to Africa and Latin America, including Brazil, where an estimated 60,000 donkeys have been slaughtered for export to China each year.

Most donkeys came from Brazil’s northeastern state of Bahia, where animals were killed before they could even reproduce. For a time, it appeared China’s relentless demand for eijao would fuel the donkey’s extinction.

Fortunately, Brazilian courts intervened before this could happen.

According to The Donkey Sanctuary, a UK rescue that advocates on behalf of donkeys worldwide, a Brazilian court issued its donkeys a “stay of execution” by reinstating a national ban on slaughtering donkeys for export to China.

The decision was heralded by animal advocates, including the Donkey Sanctuary, which petitioned the government to intervene on behalf of its donkeys, who were being killed at an alarming rate ever since a previous ban was reversed.

“Since 2019, when the ban was overturned, donkeys in Brazil have been slaughtered in their tens of thousands every year,” said Ian Cawsey, Director of Advocacy and Campaigns at The Donkey Sanctuary, in a statement.

“The judges spoke with passion about the role of the donkey in Brazilian culture and tradition and how their slaughter was out of step with the respect they have earned,” Cawsey continued. “Hopefully, Brazil’s decision will send a message to other South American nations who allow donkeys to be killed for their skins, that sometimes the value of an animal goes beyond its worth in dollars.”

But although Brazil’s donkeys have won this round, donkeys around the world remain in great danger.

“From Tanzania to Peru, South Africa to Pakistan, donkeys across the world are being stolen and skinned in the night, their carcasses found by distraught owners and their skins imported into China,” said Alex Mayers, the Donkey Sanctuary’s head of programs.

One way to help donkeys is by demanding an end to China’s donkey skin trade, which fuels the slaughter of millions of innocent animals each year.

Sign this petition to tell the Chinese government to ban the slaughter and export of donkeys for their skins.

Source: The Animal Rescue Site Blog