More Chinese push to end wildlife markets as WHO declares coronavirus emergency
On a farm near Beijing last September, a group of conservationists put in a call to police: They’d found thousands of live birds being stored in a barn. Police seized and released the birds—about 10,000 in all—which had been caught illegally with traps and were destined for restaurants and markets in southern China. Among them were yellow-breasted buntings, critically endangered songbirds whose numbers have been in freefall, largely because people in parts of China want to eat them.
The spread of a deadly strain of coronavirus, sourced to a wildlife market in Wuhan and now a global health emergency, according to the World Health Organization, has thrust China’s live wild animal trade into the spotlight. On January 26, China announced a ban on its wild animal trade until the crisis is over. Images of sick, suffering animals in markets, and videos of bats boiling alive in bowls of soup have circulated in media, sparking outrage globally and creating the impression that buying live wild animals for eating is a megascale phenomenon in China.
The reality is more nuanced. In Guangzhou, a city of 14 million in the southeast and a frequent destination for yellow-breasted buntings, eating wildlife appears exceedingly common. In Beijing, it’s exceedingly rare.
In reality, to many Chinese, consuming wild animals is a cultural outlier. State-controlled media outlets such as China Daily have published scathing editorials denouncing the practice and calling for a permanent wildlife trade ban. These calls in turn are amplified by thousands of Chinese citizens on state-censored social media networks such as Weibo, indicating that the government seems to be letting the momentum build.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2020/01/china-bans-wildlife-trade-after-coronavirus-outbreak/?cmpid=org=ngp::mc=crm-email::src=ngp::cmp=editorial::add=Animals_20200130&rid=FB26C926963C5C9490D08EC70E179424
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