South Korea to create a committee to study whether to outlaw dog meat

The Prime Minister of South Korea, Kim Boo-kyum, announced today the creation of a joint committee in order to establish “a social consensus” on the need or not to ban the traditional consumption of dog meat in the Asian country.
“We will form a joint public-private advisory body led by citizens and achieve social consensus,” Kim said, speaking by the official Yonhap news agency during a political coordination meeting held in Seoul today.
“The controversy surrounding dog meat is not new and has persisted for more than 30 years since the 1988 Seoul Olympics,” Kim said.
In order not to tarnish the external image of the country In the face of the celebration of those Olympic Games, the South Korean Government banned in the eighties to sell dog meat in the center of Seoul.
Countless organizations have since called for the government to ban their sale and consumption, which has been greatly reduced in the last two decades.
The meeting held today in Seoul comes after South Korean President Moon Jae-in, a well-known dog lover, commented in a meeting with Kim in September on the need to “carefully study the possibility of banning the consumption of dog meat.”
“In the face of the sharp increase in the number of households with pets and the growing public interest in animal rights and welfare, we are seeing a growing call to stop considering dog meat consumption as part of a traditional food culture,” Kim added at today’s meeting.
South Korea’s current animal protection law seeks to prevent cruelty in the breeding and slaughter of dogs, but does not prohibit their consumption.
The current positions in the country on this situation seem very mixed, with a recent survey pointing out that 48.9% of South Koreans are against banning their consumption compared to 38.6% who are.
In turn, surveys from previous years show that more than 80% of South Koreans have never tried dog meat and have no intention of doing so, while most of the large markets for this type of meat have already closed and the government and various associations have managed to close many farms and slaughterhouses.

Original source in Spanish