ejiao

Increased demand for the supply of donkey hides for use in the Traditional Chinese Medicine e’jiao, is leading to a re-appraisal of donkeys’ contributions to livelihoods across the world. This research aimed to understand the utilitarian value donkeys provide to poor small holder farmers, especially women, in their efforts to make a living in two rural communities in northern Ghana. Uniquely, children and donkey butchers were interviewed for the first time about their donkeys. A qualitative thematic analysis was undertaken of data disaggregated by sex, age and donkey-ownership. The majority of protocols were repeated during a second visit, ensuring comparative data between one wet, and one dry season. Donkeys are more important in people’s lives than had previously been recognised and are highly valued by their owners for their help in reducing drudgery and the multi-functional services they offer. Hiring out donkeys to generate income is a secondary role for people who own donkeys, especially women. However, for financial and cultural reasons the way donkeys are kept results in the loss of a certain percentage of the animals to the donkey meat market, as well as the global hides trade. Increasing demand for donkey meat, coupled with increasing demand for donkeys for farming, is leading to donkey price inflation and theft of donkeys. This is putting pressure on the donkey population of neighbouring Burkina Faso and pricing resource-poor non-donkey owners out of the market. E’jiao has put the spotlight on the value of dead donkeys for the first time, especially to governments and middlemen. This study shows that the value of live donkeys to poor farming households is substantial. It attempts to understand and document this value thoroughly, should the majority of donkeys in West Africa be rounded up and slaughtered for the value of their meat and skin instead.

Journal

PLOS ONE

Volume

Issue

Publication date

22 February 2023

Research output

Available Open Access

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0274337

URL

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0274337

Keywords

human-animal interaction

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Donkey skin trade and its non-compliance with legislative framework

Donkeys (Equus asinus) are facing a global crisis. Their welfare, and even survival, is being compromised as the demand for their skins increases. This demand is driven by the need to supply raw materials to produce ejiao, a traditional Chinese medicine made from collagen extracted from donkey skins. Since there is no productive chain for donkey skin production outside of China, the global trade is an entirely extractive industry that has resulted in the decimation of some local donkey populations. The donkey skin trade is demonstrably unsustainable, from the ethical issues associated with poor welfare, to the biosecurity and human health risks the trade poses; and it violates both legal frameworks and moral expectations at both a national and global level.

Journal

Frontiers in Veterinary Science

Volume

Publication date

17 March 2022

DOI

https://doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2022.849193

URL

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fvets.2022.849193/full

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Under the skin: donkeys in crisis

Alex Mayers

Australasian Animal Studies Conference

Presentation date

2 July 2017

Increased levels of personal wealth in China are fuelling demand for luxury products including ejiao, a product made using donkey skin. A traditional medicine, ejiao’s popularity is largely due to its reported anti-aging properties. Demand for donkey skins to produce ejiao is conservatively estimated at 4 million per year. This represents a significant proportion of the global donkey population of 44 million. China’s own donkey population has nearly halved in the last 20 years and entrepreneurs are now looking worldwide to satisfy a growing demand. Despite their essential role in livelihoods and 30 community resilience donkeys are largely invisible in livestock policies, livelihoods and humanitarian projects. It is therefore unsurprising that the emerging trade in skins is also invisible. Donkeys are frequently stolen from owners across Africa and illegally slaughtered in the bush; only the skins are removed and carcasses left to rot. In other areas, donkeys are bought at less than current market value and are transported in inhumane conditions to recently built legal slaughterhouses. In the short term donkey owners are facing donkey prices that have increased up to tenfold within a few years and they are without the means to replace animals they depend on. The invisibility of the trade is compounded by illegitimate export practices and criminal gangs. Due to the lucrative market for skins intensive farms are present in China and are likely to expand to other countries. Such rearing creates significant welfare concerns for a species poorly adapted to intensive practices. Australia has been exploring harvesting feral donkeys in the Northern Territories, possibly including some considered by indigenous communities to be owned and with cultural significance. This demand risks the welfare of donkeys, the communities who live with them, and, within a few decades, perhaps the species as a whole.

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Donkey skin: the invisible fur trade

Alex Mayers

Faith A. Burden

4th Annual Oxford Animal Ethics Summer School

Presentation date

25 July 2017

Increased levels of personal wealth in China is fuelling demand for luxury products including ejiao, a product made using donkey skin. A traditional medicine, ejiao’s popularity is largely due to its reported ‘anti-aging’ properties. Demand for donkey skins to produce ejiao is conservatively estimated at 4 million per year. This represents a significant proportion of the global donkey population of 44 million. China’s own donkey population has nearly halved in the last 20 years and entrepreneurs are now looking worldwide to satisfy a growing demand.

Despite their essential role in livelihoods and community resilience donkeys are largely invisible in livestock policies, livelihoods and humanitarian projects. It is therefore unsurprising that the emerging trade in skins is also invisible. Donkeys are frequently stolen from owners across Africa and illegally slaughtered in the bush; only the skins are removed and carcasses left to rot. In other areas, donkeys are bought at less than current market value and are transported in inhumane conditions to recently built ‘legal’ slaughterhouses. The invisibility of the legal and illegal markets is compounded by illegitimate export practices and criminal gangs. Due to the lucrative market for skins intensive farms are present in China and are likely to expand to other countries, such rearing creates significant welfare concerns for a species poorly adapted to intensive practices. Even if awareness of this trade improves, in the short term donkey owners are facing donkey prices that have increased up to tenfold within a few years and they are without the means to replace animals they depend on.

This emerging trade is, essentially, a fur trade with animal skins being sourced for human beauty. However while furs are visible, the role of donkey skins in ejiao products is invisible to the end user, mirroring the invisibility of the trade and donkeys themselves.

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Hide nor hair – the illicit trade in donkey hides is a threat to wild asses

Zoe Raw

Presentation date

2 September 2019

Event

2nd International Wild Equid Conference

The global donkey population is estimated at 44 million and is largely associated with economically developing nations where donkeys are used as working animals. Donkeys play a central and critical role in supporting the livelihoods of millions of people accross the world, providing support for farming, enabling access to resources, and in food production. Global demand for diverse products of donkey origin has escalated rapidly, with a particular interest in the premium products resulting from donkey skins.

Ejiao is a traditional Chinese medicine product which is based upon extracts of donkey gelatin from donkey skins, mixed with herbs and other ingredients to form a gelatinous bar, which is marketed as a miracle cure for multiple health problems. Since 2010, consumer demand for ejiao has increased rapidly, and subsequently, so has the demand for donkey skins. The Donkey Sanctuary estimate that a minimum of 1.8 million donkey skins are being traded per year, but this may be a gross underestimate. The increasing wealth and diaspora of the Chinese middle classes, alongside the apparent credibility of ejiao products, appears to have created such a high level of demand for donkey skins that global supply is struggling to keep up, leading to high prices and widespread claims of fraud. Such high levels of demand by the Chinese market are fuelling global reports of donkey theft and a sudden increase in the purchase price of donkeys. Products of donkey origin are so highly sought after that ejiao can sell for up to USD $500/kg.

The alarmingly high demand for donkey skins, and high prices that a donkey skin can fetch, positions donkey skin in a similar position as ivory or rhino horn. There is a complete lack of regulation over the utilisation of donkeys for the skin trade to fuel ejiao production, and new slaughter houses are opening at rapid rates to keep up with demand. Consequently, there has been a sharp rise in donkey thefts. As well as being unsustainable and harmful to rural livelihoods, this illicit trade could have devastating effects on populations of wild asses. Donkey skin is highly valuable, yet increasingly scarce, making it feasible that traders will start targeting wild asses. The Afrcan Wild Ass Equus africanus is Critically Endangered, with fewer than 200 mature indivduals remaining in the wild; unfortunately, the species occupies an area of Africa where the trade in donkey skins is high, exposing it to risk of being targeted. There is also some indication that populations of Asiatic Wild Ass Equus hemionus could also come under threat, given their proximity to China and surrounding socioeconomic climate.

The international trade in donkey skins has emerged rapidly and fiercely, and is grossly unsustainable. The trade has the significant potential to eradicate populations of donkeys across Africa, and poses a serious threat to the conservation and survival of African Wild Ass populations. In this presentation I raise and highlight these issues, and open up discussion for how this new threat may be mitigated for the conservation and management of wild equids.

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