WASHINGTON – The shy and shaggy Sapsaree puppy at the Alexandria, Virginia, animal shelter seems healthy and happy, a far cry from how she looked two years ago when she arrived from an overcrowded dog meat farm in South Korea.
Her fate until then was slaughter, her flesh and bones destined to be used as meat or in soup. Emaciated and suffering from a broken leg, probably from confinement in a metal cage, the 5-month-old puppy was named “Minnow” by the deputy director of the Animal Welfare League of Alexandria, Abbie Hubbard, who adopted her.
Minnow is one of 770 dogs rescued so far as part of a worldwide campaign to end the practice of raising dogs for human consumption in South Korea. About 200 rescues landed at Washington Dulles International Airport last week.
There are an estimated 17,000 dog meat farms in South Korea, animal-rights activists say. The industry dates back centuries, and in Korean culture, soups and other dishes made with dog meat are considered delicacies.
Six of the farms have been bought by Humane Society International in the past two years and closed. Dogs from those farms have been shipped to animal shelters throughout North America, and Washington-area residents have adopted about 100 of them over the past two years.
The sixth farm, in Wonju, South Korea, shut its doors this week.
Activists are working with Koreans inside and outside the government to end the dog meat trade, hoping to prompt some action before the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Just last month, South Korea’s largest dog meat market, which sells an estimated 80,000 dogs for human consumption each year, announced that it plans to stop slaughtering and selling dogs by May. The market said it will use a strategy pioneered by the Humane Society – paying vendors to get into another business, such as raising blueberry crops.
“Our actions are showing that there is interest among farmers who are willing to change their businesses,” said Raul Arce-Contreras, the society’s Maryland-based spokesman. “We simply do not have the resources to close all the farms, which is why it is crucial that the South Korean government begin a program to phase out the dog meat farms.”
