South China Morning Post
Advertisement
Advertisement
Children carry jerrycans of water back home using a donkey cart after filling them at one of the water points within the a camp for internally displaced people on the outskirts of Dollow, in Jubaland state, Somalia, on January 30. Donkeys are used as a means of transport in many African countries. Photo: EPA-EFE
Opinion
Peter J. Li
Peter J. Li

In Africa, China needs ‘donkey diplomacy’

  • The trade in donkey skins has decimated the animal’s population, adversely affecting poor African families and thus harming China’s reputation
  • Beijing can support the African Union’s ban on the trade by cracking down on products that use donkey skin and looking into manufacturers’ scientific and cultural claims
Peter J. Li
Peter J. Li
Why you can trust SCMP
On February 18, the African Union, an intergovernmental organisation that encompasses the continent’s 55 states, approved a 15-year moratorium on the trade in donkey skins.
For years, donkey hides have been shipped to China to make ejiao, a gelatin used in an alleged traditional Chinese medicine “cure-all”. The decision to stop the slaughter of Africa’s donkeys, a means of production for some of the poorest on the continent, is a significant milestone.
The China-bound trade is threatening the donkey population worldwide. Having exhausted domestic donkeys, ejiao businesses have in the last decade or so turned to the animals on the African continent. A 2016 study by The Donkey Sanctuary, a UK-based charity, found that the trade resulted in the death of up to 4.8 million donkeys worldwide a year, largely in African countries.

The number of donkeys slaughtered globally rose to 5.9 million in 2021 according to The Donkey Sanctuary. Without preventive action being taken, some 6.8 million donkeys could be butchered in 2027 for the skin trade, the charity’s report this year predicted.

The increase in donkey slaughter in Africa coincided with a 160 per cent increase in China’s production of ejiao, which is said to be good for strengthening the body, prolonging life and enhancing beauty. Unsurprisingly, the rise of the donkey skin trade has followed the expansion of Sino-African trade.

Few realise that every part of the donkey skin trade is flagrantly inhumane. Indiscriminate sourcing, including wanton theft, often send young and old, fit and sick, and even pregnant donkeys to slaughter. Transport often involves moving the donkeys on foot for days under the blazing African sun often without food, water or rest. Holding facilities are deplorable. Slaughter happens in front of other donkeys in cruel ways.

Donkeys are transported for days under the hot sun without food or water before being slaughtered inhumanely. Photo: The Donkey Sanctuary

While the policy elites in China might not be very concerned about the well-being of donkeys, the economic and reputational costs of the trade should serve as a warning.

The trade is depriving some of the poorest communities in Africa of a crucial means of livelihood. At least 13 million of the world’s 42 to 53 million donkeys live and work in Africa. Despite technological advancement and modern farming tools, donkeys remain a key source of income there.

Not only are donkeys used to transport life’s necessities, draught animals in food production are a stepping stone for families out of hunger. Donkeys and horses play important livelihood roles for 300-600 million people globally, 158 million in Africa alone. The China-bound trade has reportedly reduced about half of Kenya’s donkey population between 2009 and 2019.

Men ride donkey-pulled carts along a deserted street in Omdourman, Sudan, on April 16 last year. Photo: AFP
It is in China’s national interest to join the African Union in stopping donkey skin imports. The cruelty of the trade is such that no “panda diplomacy” can mend the damage it has caused to China’s reputation. It does not project the “lovable” image that the Chinese leadership would like to cultivate.
The donkey skin trade could overshadow or diminish the significance of China’s debt relief efforts in favour of some African countries, instead creating or reinforcing the image of Chinese businesses which, while capitalising on their country’s massive business presence on the continent, cannot care less about the livelihoods of the poor in their efforts to grab African resources to create demand for high-end products.

Ejiao, like other “cure-all” remedies made from wild animal parts or bodily fluid, is a supply-driven product. Produced to meet “demand” that never existed in China on today’s scale, ejiao is a textbook example of how demand can be artificially inflated by the business interests concerned.

The framing of ejiao as a “traditional” remedy for all kinds of ailments with a 3,000-year history has helped one producer in Shandong experience a meteoric rise in profit.

02:17

Traditional Chinese medicine-infused food becomes new fad among young Chinese

Traditional Chinese medicine-infused food becomes new fad among young Chinese
Recent oversupply of donkey skin has driven producers to diversify their products from medicine to luxury cosmetics and cake with ejiao ingredients. But the medicinal effects of the products have been questioned by doctors in China.

It is time that China seriously looks at ejiao, its alleged medicinal effects, and, importantly, its impact on the livelihood of donkey-dependent communities in Africa and elsewhere. China should not just investigate the biggest ejiao producers. It should also look into the roots of the myth of ejiao to end profit-seeking schemes in the name of traditional culture, stopping a trade that hurts the poor.

Peter J. Li is an associate professor of animal policy at the University of Houston-Downtown and a visiting fellow in the Brooks McCormick Jr. Animal Law & Policy Program at Harvard Law School

5