Wildlife protection has long been a contentious issue in China, with animal rights groups criticizing existing laws for lacking sufficient protection for endangered species.The current wildlife protection law was implemented in 1989, and it allows such practices as farming tigers and bears for traditional Chinese medicine and other commercial uses.But critics say the animals are kept captive in terrible conditions and argue that farming practice itself actually reduces wildlife population.Take the example of the bear-farming industry.According to Animals Asia, a Hong Kong-based charity, black bears that are farmed for bile, which is used to produce traditional Chinese medicine, suffer from poor living conditions.It also argues that it is cruel to extract bile from living bears because it causes immense distress.What’s more, while the number of black bears in captivity has risen to 10,000 in recent years, the population of black bears in the wild, for instance in Changbai Mountains in the northeast fell by 93.4 percent from 1990 to 2010.Many animal protection experts interviewed by Caixin have also said the law has loopholes that create leeway for poaching and illegal trading of wildlife products, which has pushed many species to the verge of extinction over the past two decades.Some changes to that law have been proposed and a draft has been open to public consultation between January 29 and February 5.But conservationists denounced the revision, saying that instead of offering protection for endangered animals in China, it has gone the very opposite direction.
