THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
J
oseph Kamonjo Kariuki, 37, known in his Kenyan village as “Joseph of the Donkeys,” thinks three of his animals were victims of a black market scheme that uses donkey skins as a key ingredient in a Chinese health fad.
Animal rights groups say agents are seeking to feed China’s insatiable appetite for a gelatin they call ejiao (pronounced “uh-jee-ow”), which is made from stewed donkey skins and purports to provide health benefits.
Shrinking donkey herds in China have driven ejiao producers to seek supplies from Africa, Australia and South America, activists say. Fourteen African governments have banned the export of donkey skins, according to the United Kingdom-based animal welfare group Donkey Sanctuary.
In Kenya, the donkey population has fallen in the past nine years from 1.8 million to 1.2 million. Kenya’s three licensed slaughterhouses butcher 1,000 donkeys a day to supply skins to China, said Calvin Onyango of the Donkey Sanctuary Kenya.
Most Kenyan donkey hides end up in an eastern Chinese town called Dong’e, where most of the world’s ejiao is made. On the road into Dong’e, billboards proclaim the gelatin’s purported curative powers.
Ejiao demand has driven prices from $78 per hide in 2010 to $405 in 2015, according to the Shandong Ejiao Association. China’s donkey population has gone from 9.4 million in 1996 to 5.5 million in 2015, according to Chinese state media.
State-built donkey slaughterhouses have sprung up in Botswana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Namibia and Tanzania. Niger’s hide exports tripled. Botswana slaughtered 3 percent of its donkey population in six months, according to the Donkey Sanctuary.
More than 2 million of the world’s 44 million donkeys are killed for their skins every year, according to Donkey Sanctuary.
In western Zimbabwe, farmers like the Chingodza family are resisting market pressure to sell their donkeys. “I like my donkeys. They help a lot and are dear to me,” said Jeffrey Chingodza, 65. “I won’t sell for export to Chinese abattoirs.”
His 20-year-old son, Tawanda, however, said surging prices are tempting.
“When you have a car, and you get the first buyer saying, ‘I will give you $3,000 for it,’ and the second buyer says, ‘I will give you $6,000,’ what would you do?” Tawanda said. “I will definitely sell. All of us want money.”