Slaughter of Africa's Donkeys for China Hurts Poorest Farmers
by
Mustapha Muhammad
and
Pauline Bax
Donkey skins produce anti-ageing gelatin popular in China
Mass slaughter threatens communities that rely on the animal
When the impoverished West African nation of Niger
imposed a ban on donkey exports last year, a small community of traders
just over the border in Nigeria was devastated.
“Before the ban,
you could see thousands of donkeys here,” said Mohammed Sani, a
45-year-old trader in the Nigerian town of Jibiya, as he wiped the sweat
off his brow. “Now look at them: there’s no more than 50, crippling the
business.”
Donkey skins dry at a slaughterhouse in Baringo.
Photographer: Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images
Donkeys
are being slaughtered at an alarming pace to feed a global trade in
donkey hides that’s fueled by soaring demand in China, where the skins
are used to manufacture a gelatin believed to have anti-ageing and
libido-enhancing properties. The gelatin, known in China as e’jiao, is
so popular with middle-class consumers that a Chinese producer has
created a donkey exchange
to help companies find enough hides to keep their factories busy. There
are about 3 million donkeys left in China, from 11 million in the early
1990s.
With its large
donkey population and close trade relations with China, Africa is a key
target for donkey buyers. Annual global sales of the cooked gelatin may
be worth as much as $2.6 billion, based on the 2014 per-kilogram sales
price in China, according to the U.K.-based charity, The Donkey Sanctuary.
“The
skin trade is really something that just came out of nowhere, and it’s
the biggest, fastest crisis we’ve seen,” said Alex Mayers, a program
manager at The Donkey Sanctuary. “People in poor communities can no
longer replace donkeys if they’ve been stolen or slaughtered because the
prices are just too high.”
Export Ban
Like the poaching of Africa’s rhinos and elephants, and deforestation caused by the largely illicit trade in rosewood timber,
the slaughter of donkeys is an unforeseen consequence of rising Chinese
incomes and an expanding middle class. While the global donkey
population is estimated at 44 million, demand is currently thought to be
at least 4 million per year, The Donkey Sanctuary said in a report this
year.
Donkeys stand with carts of water.
Photographer: Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images
Donkeys
are essential to tens of millions of farmers in Africa’s driest
regions, often also the most impoverished, and the skin trade is
threatening to upset rural economies that rely heavily on the animals
for transporting everything from produce to cattle feed.
“In
Kenya, the net economic value of a working donkey is $2,300 a year. If
you sell it for slaughter, you get a fraction of that: it will give you
an income for a single month,” Mayers said. “A donkey is worth a hell of
lot more alive than dead.”
That’s why Niger
halted exports of the animal and completely prohibited their
slaughtering after it found that donkey exports in the first nine months
of 2016 had almost tripled compared to the whole of 2015. In
neighboring Burkina Faso, the doubling of the price of a donkey and the
slaughter of 45,000 donkeys out of a population of 1.5 million prompted
the government in August last year to impose an export ban.
Mali,
Senegal and Gambia followed suit. Zimbabwe, where donkeys are less
common, turned down an application to build a donkey slaughterhouse,
while Ethiopia closed its only functioning donkey abattoir after
residents complained about the stench and pollution.
But
large-scale slaughtering continues in many African countries, including
Tanzania, Ghana and Kenya, and online sales ads for donkey hides are
especially easy to find in Nigeria.
Packed Truck
Donkeys
don’t reproduce easily and are difficult to breed commercially.
“They’ve never been good at being a reproductive species,” Mayers said.
“It’s not where their value lies.”
In
Nigeria, some traders have turned to smuggling the animals from Niger. A
trader-turned-smuggler said he was recently caught with five donkeys
when trying to “sneak into” Nigeria. Border officials from Niger seized
the animals and fined him the equivalent of $650, but he said he planned
to stay in the trade because “it’s the only business I know.”
“Before
the ban, I imported a truck packed with donkeys from Niger almost every
week and sold them at $44 per donkey,” said the trader, whose full name
was withheld because of fear of being caught. “Now, the price has risen
to $150 or higher.”
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