Vile trade: Bear Bile farming should be outlawed

JASPER is an Asiatic black bear, also known as a moon bear because of the yellow crescent on his chest. In 2000 he came to the Animals Asia Moon Bear Rescue Centre in Chengdu, China, from a bear farm.

When Jasper arrived his rescuers had to cut him out of a tiny "crush cage" that pinned him down so the farmer could extract lucrative bile from his gall bladder. Bear bile is used in traditional Chinese medicine and fetches a tidy price. In China, the wholesale price is around 4000 yuan (approximately $580) per kilogram; each bear produces up to 5 kilograms a year. But it comes at terrible cost.

Jasper spent 15 years in his cage. Other bears spend up to 25 years in cages no bigger than their bodies, barely able to move. Bears are milked for bile twice a day. In China, farmers use a crude catheter inserted into the gall bladder or a permanently open wound. In Vietnam, they use long hypodermic needles.

Over the past 10 years, Animals Asia has rescued 260 bears from Chinese bear farms. These are the lucky ones. The official number of farmed bears in China is 7000, but Animals Asia fears the real figure is closer to 10,000.