Animal breeders are having difficulty getting new homes for dogs, now there is a risk that many have to be slaughtered.
When not preaching the Word of God, the Reverend Joo Yeong-Bong is creating dogs for slaughter.
But the business is not doing well. In fact, it is about to illegate.
“Since last summer, we are trying to sell our dogs, but traders continue to hesitate,” Joo, 60, told BBC. “None of them appeared.”
In 2024, the government of South Korea implemented a national ban on the sale of dog meat for consumption. Historical legislation, which was approved in January last year, gives creators like Joo Until February 2027 to end their operations and sell the remaining animals.
But many say that this time It’s not enough To discontinue a sector that served as a means of subsistence for generations – and warn that authorities have not yet created adequate safeguards for the breeders or for the captive half a million dogs.
Even those who support the ban, including experts and animal rights advocates, pointed out problems related to their application – including Difficulty in relocating dogs That, after being saved from the slaughterhouse, they now face the increasingly likely threat of euthanasia.
At half a tolerance, dog breeders are faced with hundreds of animals virtually impossible to sell, farms that cannot be closed and few ways to put food on the table.
“People are suffering“, Says Joo, who is also president of the Korean Association of Dogs for consumption, a group that represents the sector.“ We are drowning in debt, we can’t pay them, and some can’t even find a new job. ”
“It’s a desperate situation.”
A flood of obstacles
Chan-woo has 18 months to get rid of 600 dogs.
After that, the 33 -year -old creator – who preferred to maintain anonymity for fear of any retaliation – could take a sentence of up to two years in prison.
“Even on my farm, I can’t process the number of dogs I have during this period,” he says. “At this point, I invested all my assets – and yet they They are not even taking dogs.”
For “them”, Chan-woo not only refers to traders and carving who, before the ban, bought an average of half a dozen dogs a week.
It is also referring to animal rights activists and authorities who, in their opinion, after they have fought both to ban dog meat trade, do not have a clear plan Regarding what to do with the remaining animals – about 500,000 left, according to government estimates.
Lee Sangkyung, campaign manager at Humane World for Animals Korea (HWAK), agrees with these concerns.
“Although the prohibition of dog meat has been approved, both the government and civil society groups are still trying to find out How to rescue dogs remaining, ”he says.“ An area that still looks needy is the discussion about the dogs that were left behind. ”
A spokesman for the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (Mafra) told the BBC that if farms owners delivered their dogs, local governments would assume property in shelters.
However, relocating them has been shown to be a challenge.
As weight is equivalent to profit in the dog meat sector, Thursdays tend to prefer larger races. But in the highly urbanized society of South Korea, where many people live in apartments, aspiring pet owners usually want the opposite.
There is also a social stigma associated with dogs that come from meat farms, explains Lee, due to concerns about disease and trauma. The question is even more complicated by the fact that many are pure or mestizo grooming, a race classified as “dangerous” in South Korea, and requires government approval to be kept as a pet.
Meanwhile, the rescue shelters are already overcrowded.
This perfect storm of obstacles reveals a perverse irony: numerous rescue dogs, with nowhere to go, now face the prospect of being sacrificed.
“It is simply unbelievable“Says Chan-Woo.
The government sought to soften these concerns weeks later, stating that euthanasia of animals “certainly” was not part of its plan.
More recently, Mafra told BBC that it was investing about 6 billion Korean Won per year to expand animal shelters and support private facilities, which would offer up to 600,000 Korean wons to dogs to creators who ended their business earlier.
But Chun Myung-Sun, director of the Department of Veterinary Medical Education of the National University of Seoul, agrees that the broadest government plan for the remaining dogs is quite disabled.
“There must be a concrete discussion about how to ‘get rid’ of dogs,” he says.
“Both adoption and euthanasia should be on the agenda. [Mas] if we strive to rescue dogs from a cruel slaughter to then submit them to euthanasiait is understandable that people feel hurt and irritated. ”
