THE country said it will formally end its dwindling yet much-criticised bear bile farming industry this week, though about 200 bears are still kept in pens and bred for their gallbladders.
The Climate, Energy and Environment Ministry announced on Tuesday it will ban breeding and possession of bears and extraction of their bile beginning today.
The change is in line with a revised animal rights protection law that imposes up to two or five years of jail sentences to violators.
South Korea is one of the few countries that allow farming to extract bile from bears, mostly Asiatic black bears known as moon bears, for traditional medicine or food believed to promote vitality and stamina.
But the popularity of the practice has nosedived in the past two decades in response to questions about its medicinal effects, the introduction of cheaper medical alternatives and public awareness of animal cruelty.
The plan is part of a broader 2022 agreement among officials, farmers and animal rights campaigners to prohibit bear bile farming beginning in 2026.
Animal rights groups are responsible for handling purchases of bears from farmers and the government establishing facilities to hold them.
A total of 21 bears has been purchased and relocated to a government-run sanctuary in the southern Jeolla province this year.
But 199 bears are still raised in 11 farms across the country while disputes continue over the amount of money to be paid to farmers for giving up their bears, said officials, activists and farmers.
The Environment Ministry said it will place a six-month grace period for existing farmers and punish bile extraction within the law’s limits, while also providing a financial incentive to farmers who keep their animals until they are sold and moved.
“Our plan to end bear farming business is an implementation of our country’s resolve to improve welfare of wild animals and fulfill our related responsibility,” Environment Minister Kim Sung-whan said in a statement.
“We will strive to help bears protected until the last one.”
Kim Kwang-soo, a farmer who raises 78 bears in the southern city of Dangjin, said other farmers sold their bears at extremely cheap prices because of economic difficulties, though he hasn’t sold any of his animals.
“This is a very bad policy,” Kim said. “I’ll still observe the law because I’d suffer some disadvantages if I don’t do so.”
About 1,000 bears were raised in farms in South Korea in 2014.
They were the descendants of bears imported from Malaysia and other South-East Asian countries when bear farming began in South Korea in the early 1980s.
Animal rights groups praised South Korea’s government for pressing ahead with the 2022 agreement but urged it to establish bigger protection facilities to accept rescued bears. — AP
