Fast-track closing of donkey hide processing facilities, Bolgatanga Assembly urged

The Bolgatanga Municipal Assembly in the Upper East Region has been urged to fast-track measures to clamp down on the processing and exportation of donkey hides currently taking place in the area.Donyaepa and the Ghana National Poultry Network Association (GAPNET), two non-governmental organisations which have been working to protect donkeys and the mass slaughter of donkeys for hide from going extinct made the call at the side-lines of stakeholder engagement in Bolgatanga.Stakeholders have raised concerns over the illegal mass slaughter and processing of donkeys for hide in the country particularly in Northern part of the country, stressing that the situation is leading to extinction.They said the phenomenon was being perpetuated by some Chinese nationals and supported by some indigenes to illegally slaughter donkeys particularly in Northern Ghana, process the hide and export to China.About two of such donkeys hide processing centres have been identified in the Bolgatanga Municipality and stakeholder s including civil society organisations have called on the Assembly to work with relevant stakeholders to close the facilities.Dr Roger Adamu Lure Kanton, National Advocacy Officer, Fight Against Donkey Extinction (FADE) Ghana project, said due to the mass slaughter of donkeys and export of their hides to China over the years, the donkey population was becoming extinct especially in Ghana and other neighbouring countries.He said the continued operations of the facilities in the Bolgatanga Municipality would deepen the situation and charged the Assembly and other relevant stakeholders to work together to address the situation urgently.'We want the facility to be closed before the end of the year because it is something that cannot be prolonged. Now, the donkeys are no more coming from neighbouring Burkina Faso or Mali, they are coming from as far as Senegal and we cannot sit and wait,' he stressed.Dr Kanton called on the media to intensify advocacy for stakeholders and institutions to ban the exportati on of donkey hides from the entry points particularly at the ports and harbours, adding that it would contribute to addressing the challenge.With funding support from Brooke Foundation, United Kingdom, Donyaepa and GAPNET have been engaging various stakeholders as part of the FADE Ghana project being implemented by the two organisations in collaboration with Brooke West Africa in Dakar, Senegal.The project which is being implemented in the East Mamprusi and West Mamprusi Municipalities in the North East Region, and the Bolgatanga, Kassena-Nankana Municipalities and Bongo District in the Upper East Region, seeks to rally the support of relevant stakeholders to fight against the illegal slaughter of donkeys in Ghana for their hide for export to China.Through the project, the biggest donkey slaughterhouse in Ghana located at Walewale where 100 to 150 donkeys were slaughtered daily has been closed.In 2014, all the Chief Veterinary doctors of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) met in Ab uja and came out with a communique to their governments which Ghana is part to ban the mass slaughter of donkeys.Additionally, a few months ago, the African Union in Addis Ababa also banned the slaughter of donkey for hide in all African nations which Ghana is part.Source: Ghana News Agency