The Donkey Dealers Association (DDA) on Monday said over three million jobs will be lost if the proposed ban on donkey slaughtering in the country is implemented.
This was disclosed by the national chairman of the association, Mr Ifeanyi Dike, at a one-day public hearing on eight bills for the agriculture sector on Monday.
The public hearing was organised by the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development chaired by Sen. Bima Enagi.
The bill is entitled: “Donkey Slaughter Regulation and Export Certification Bill, 2020” and sponsored by Senator Yahaya Abdullahi.
The bill which passed second reading on July 6, 2021 is aimed at mitigating the extinction of donkeys given their aesthetic, ecological, educational, historical, recreational and scientific value to the nation.
It also seeks to declare donkeys as an endangered species which as a result of indiscriminate slaughtering for the purpose of harvesting its skin, has greatly depleted the national herd of the animal.
Mr Dike, however, said the outright ban on slaughtering of donkeys was not a solution to the envisaged extinction of donkeys in the country.
“We should know that the outright blanket ban as proposed by this bill will create some powerful smuggling syndicates who are bent on getting the donkey derivatives for export to China thereby sabotaging the economy.
“The blanket ban on donkey killing and export of its derivatives as a result of morbid fear of its extinction has failed to realise that regulation, ranching and breeding is the solution.
“Cows which we slaughter more than 50,000 on a daily basis as meat have not gone into extinction, so how can a donkey with the same gestation period as cow go into extinction. We should encourage breeding and ranching,” he said.
Mr Dike further said that the dealers had invested heavily over the years and had also signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with National Animal Production Research Institute (NAPRI) for the breeding and production of five million donkeys within a space of 10 years.
“We took this action to increase the local population of donkeys in Nigeria to avoid its extinction,” he said.
“It is projected that donkey businesses, if properly regulated, are capable of injecting N10 billion annually to our economy,” he said.
Mr Dike urged the senate to consider the plight of over three million Nigerians that would be out of jobs and businesses if the bill is allowed to pass.
