South Korea Enacts Landmark Ban on Dog Meat, India's Northeast Faces Controversy Over Consumption

South Korea: The slaughter and sale of dogs for their meat are set to become illegal in South Korea. On Tuesday, South Korea’s parliament passed a landmark ban on production and sales of dog meat, as public calls for a prohibition have grown sharply over concerns about animal rights.

The legislation is set to come into force by 2027. Notably, dog meat consumption, a centuries-old practice on the Korean Peninsula, is neither explicitly banned nor legalised in South Korea.

According to a media report, recent surveys show more people want its ban and a majority of South Koreans don’t eat dog meat any longer.

But the surveys also indicated one in every three South Koreans still oppose the ban even though they don’t eat dog meat. On Tuesday, the National Assembly passed the bill by a 208-0 vote. President Yoon Suk Yeol’s government supports the ban, so the subsequent steps to make it law are considered formality.

Dog meat is widely consumed by several tribal communities in India’s Northeast, which comprises eight states that have cultural traditions that share more similarities with ethnic communities in South East Asia than South Asia.

Last year in June, the Gauhati High Court’s Kohima bench quashed a Nagaland government ban on commercial import, trading of dogs, and sale of dog meat in markets and dine-in restaurants, saying it “appears an accepted norm and food among people of Nagaland, even in modern times”.

The HC had earlier stayed the ban in November 2020 after three such traders licensed under the Kohima Municipal Council challenged the July 2020 curbs.