Animal Activist Marc Ching Makes Deal with South Korean Dog Meat Market to Close Local Slaughterhouses

News-making animal activist Marc Ching, Founder of The Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation (AHWF), has successfully secured an agreement with Gupo Meat Market in South Korea to close their slaughterhouses.

The historic agreement calls for the owners and association that run Gupo Meat Market, which has been slaughtering animals for more than a century, to not only close their dog meat slaughterhouses, but all of them; including chicken, duck and rabbit slaughterhouses.

“We reached a formal agreement that we will work together to shut the Gupo Meat Market slaughterhouses down, bring in new business or teach current ones how to do something different, while redeveloping the area; encouraging other slaughterhouses to do the same,” said Ching who personally facilitated the deal with Gupo and the association yesterday in Busan, South Korea. “By doing this, we are starting a new era of change, making history and presenting a positive solution for the future.”

Ching explains that while many local and international advocacy groups have lobbied and petitioned for the closure of Gupo’s meat market in the past, those were hostile meetings based in anger and threats; noting that the owners of Gupo Meat Market and the association said “this was the first time ever, someone has come asking how we can work together.” They called the day historic.

“While the process of emptying the cages still needs to be presented to the government, the hard part is over, getting the dog meat traders, themselves, to want to become something else,” continued Ching who made international news last year for rescuing hundreds of dogs from the 2016 Yulin Dog Meat Festival. “This is a victory for the animals and all of the people who support and believe in Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation’s ongoing plight to end the horrific trade where innocent dogs, and animals, are severely abused and tortured before being killed for their meat.”

Founded in 2011 by noted holistic nutritionist Marc Ching, The Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation is a non-profit organization that is focused on rescuing abused and neglected animals, providing full rehabilitation services and ultimately working to find them their forever families. The non-profit expanded its reach globally in 2015 to include rescuing dogs from the Asian Dog Meat Trade.

The Humane Society estimates that 30 million dogs are killed across Asia every year as part of the industry; an estimated 10 million killed in China alone.