PESHAWAR: Pakistan is poised to sign a $2 billion deal with China to set up donkey farms in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province and export the animals to the neighboring country, a representative at the provincial livestock department said on Monday.
China is Pakistan’s closest ally and the two countries are partners in a $60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor of energy and infrastructure projects, which Beijing touts as the flagship infrastructure program in its vast Belt and Road Initiative.
Sher Muhammad, the director general of the provincial livestock department, said a deal would be signed with a government-owned company from Kashgar after the Chinese New Year (February 5, 2019) whereby China would set up donkey farms in Pakistan and export donkeys.
This idea of investing in donkeys was floated by the previous chief minister of the province, Pervaiz Khattak, during the Beijing Road Show in April 2017.
Under the deal, donkey farms will be established in Mansehra, Dera Ismail Khan and the provincial capital of Peshawar.
“Donkeys die on the sea path and luckily, the Chinese border touches the northern [Khyber Pakhtunkhwa] province and is good for road export,” Muhammad said.
Muhamad said the livestock department and Brooke Hospital for Animals, a non–profit, had conducted surveys to determine that the livelihood of at least 70,000 families was attached to the province’s 0.5 million donkeys used in farming, brick kilns, construction and transportation.
Only in Beijing city alone, 500 restaurants serve donkey meat, the director said. The Chinese are interested in donkeys not just for food consumption but also to use its meat, bones, skin and other parts in cosmetics, medicines and other decoration pieces and its milk in shampoos and beauty soaps.
Muhammad said the government would export only 80,000 tagged animals annually under strict supervision to control smuggling and would start a “parallel process of artificial insemination” so that local donkey populations on which Pakistanis are dependent did not dwindle.
Pakistan aims to cash in on ‘donkey business’ with China
Pakistan aims to cash in on ‘donkey business’ with China
- Chinese firm will invest $2 billion in donkey farms and export
- Deal to be signed after Chinese New Year
Pakistan, seven Muslim nations back Palestinian technocratic body, stress Gaza-West Bank unity
- The National Committee for the Administration of the Gaza Strip was announced on January 14
- Muslim nations call for consolidation of the ceasefire and unimpeded humanitarian aid into Gaza
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and seven other Muslim-majority countries on Thursday welcomed the formation of a temporary Palestinian technocratic body to administer Gaza, stressing that it must manage daily civilian affairs while preserving the institutional and territorial link between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank amid the ongoing peace efforts.
In a joint statement, the foreign ministers of Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Türkiye, Indonesia and the United Arab Emirates said the newly announced National Committee for the Administration of the Gaza Strip would play a central role during the second phase of a broader peace plan aimed at ending the war and paving the way for Palestinian self-governance.
“The Ministers emphasize the importance of the National Committee commencing its duties in managing the day-to-day affairs of the people of Gaza, while preserving the institutional and territorial link between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, ensuring the unity of Gaza, and rejecting any attempts to divide it,” the statement said.
The committee, announced on Jan. 14, is a temporary transitional body established under United Nations Security Council Resolution 2803 and is to operate in coordination with the Palestinian Authority, the ministers said.
The statement said the move forms part of the second phase of US President Donald Trump’s Comprehensive Peace Plan for Gaza, which the ministers said they supported, praising Trump’s efforts to end the war, ensure the withdrawal of Israeli forces and prevent the annexation of the occupied West Bank.
The top leaders of all eight Muslim countries attended a meeting with Trump in New York last September, shortly before he unveiled the Gaza peace plan.
The ministers also called for the consolidation of the ceasefire, unimpeded humanitarian aid into Gaza, early recovery and reconstruction and the eventual return of the Palestinian Authority to administer the territory, leading to a just and sustainable peace based on UN resolutions and a two-state solution on pre-1967 lines with East Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital.
