The government should enforce stricter measures and punish breeders who chronically fatten “divine pigs” for weighing competitions held by some local temples, the Environment and Animal Society of Taiwan (EAST) said at a news conference in Taipei yesterday.
Playing a video of how divine pigs are abused by being force-fed and cruelly slaughtered, the EAST accused the government of turning a blind eye by failing to hold inhumane breeders accountable under the Animal Protection Act (動物保護法).
These breeders put the animals in custom-made metal cages to limit their movement and force-feed them, EAST researcher Tsun Fang-chu (寸舫筑) said.
Photo: Cheng Ming-hsiang, Taipei Times
After they have grown to a certain size, divine pigs cannot even walk, as their feet can no longer support their weight, Tsun added.
In Taiwan, some temples hold divine pig weighing competitions as part of their religious and cultural festivals. The heaviest pig is declared the winner and the owner receives a prize. All pigs are eventually killed and offered as sacrifices to a city god or a local deity.
Tsun said the group in August last year filed complaints with the Taoyuan City Government and the Council of Agriculture (COA) to protest the practice, and received the following replies: “The practice does not constitute animal abuse, as it does not create internal wounds in pigs,” “The pigs eat on their own initiative” and “Fattening divine pigs to a point where they can no longer walk is a way to maximize profits.”
Council data from last year showed that Taiwan had seven divine pig breeders at the time and 34 divine pigs nationwide, she said.
However, the Yimin Festival (義民祭) in Hsinchu County — a Hakka festival in which divine pigs are killed as offerings to gods and tributes to warriors who died fighting to protect their land — last year saw 31 divine pigs in the weighing competition, with 20 of them weighing more than 600kg, she said.
Thirty-five temples nationwide held similar contests in the same year, with the estimated number of divine pigs exceeding 270, she said, citing EAST surveys.
Although the council has for the past two decades said that it favors issuing verbal warnings instead of imposing punishments, its data on the numbers of divine pigs and breeders are not even right, she said.
“Who exactly has the COA given any verbal warning to?” she added.
The government should dole out immediate punishments and stop certain divine pig breeders from continuing the abuse, she said.
Religious dedication to deities and animal abuse do not have to go hand in hand, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said, adding that there must be a more humane way to raise divine pigs.
Folk traditions should be respected, but it is a completely different matter if a breeder raises divine pigs by abusing them to maximize economic gains, Wu said.
The tradition can be preserved without contravening the Animal Protection Act, she said, citing some temples, which hold divine pig painting contests using statues in lieu of fattened sacrificial pigs, in their effort to strike a balance between observing the tradition and animal care.
The government should encourage alternative practices and create incentives, such as economic ones, for temples to transform their way of following the tradition, she said.
SEND A MESSAGE: Sinking the amphibious assault ship, the lead warship of its class, is meant to show China the US Navy is capable of sinking their ships, an analyst said The US and allied navies plan to sink a 40,000-tonne ship at the latest Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise to simulate defeating a Chinese amphibious assault on Taiwan. This year’s RIMPAC — the 29th iteration of the world’s largest naval exercise — involves the US, 28 partners, more than 25,000 personnel, 40 warships, three submarines and more than 150 aircraft operating in and around Hawaii from yesterday to Aug. 1, the US Navy said in a press release. The major components of the event include multidomain warfare exercises in multiship surface engagements, anti-submarine warfare and multi-axis defense of a carrier strike
Taiwanese could risk being extradited to China when traveling in countries with close ties to Beijing, Taiwan Association of University Professors deputy chairman Chen Li-fu (陳俐甫) said on Friday. Chen’s comments came after China on Friday last week announced new judicial guidelines targeting Taiwanese independence advocates. Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Djibouti are among the countries where Taiwanese could risk being extradited to China, he said. The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday elevated the travel alert for China, Hong Kong and Macau to “orange” after Beijing announced its guidelines to “severely punish Taiwanese independence diehards for splitting the country and inciting secession.” Extradition treaties
The airspace around Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport and Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) is to be closed for an hour on July 25 and July 23 respectively, due to the Han Kuang military exercises, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday. The annual exercise is to be held on Taiwan proper and its outlying islands from July 22 to 26. During last year’s exercise, the military conducted anti-aircraft landing drills at the Taoyuan airport for the first time, for which a one-hour no-fly ban was issued. Based on a live-fire bulletin sent out by the Maritime and Port Bureau, the nation’s
CROSS-BORDER CRIME: The suspects cannot be charged with cybercrime in Indonesia as their targets were in Malaysia, an Indonesian immigration director said Indonesian immigration authorities have detained 103 Taiwanese after a raid at a villa on Bali, officials said yesterday. They were accused of misusing their visas and residence permits, and are suspected of possible cybercrimes, Safar Muhammad Godam, director of immigration supervision and enforcement at the Indonesian Ministry of Law and Human Rights told reporters at a news conference. “The 103 foreign nationals stayed at the villa and conducted suspicious activities, which we suspect are activities related to cybercrime activities,” he said, presenting laptops and routers at the news conference. Godam said Indonesian authorities cannot charge them with conducting cybercrime. “During the inspection, we