In many people’s minds, an animal shelter is a well-maintained sanctuary where helpless animals can rest and find shelter. We usually imagine facilities with clean rooms, sufficient food, warm heaters, and spacious yards. However, this is not the case with many animal shelters across South Korea. As the number of stray pets continues to increase each year, the more we come across the tragic news of animals being abused and receiving inadequate care in inhumane conditions. 

In 2020, the Korean Animal Welfare Association carried out an investigation into the quality of 19 different animal shelters across the country. They found that most of these animal shelters were no different from prisons, with 4 to 5 dogs cramped inside small cages and left to die in hunger and neglect. At one of the shelters, they even found dogs being kept inside a cage that also contained the dead bodies of kittens. 

Additionally, some animal shelters were found to have carried out euthanasia against hundreds of animals without using anesthesia. It was later discovered that these animal shelters had formed an illegal business relationship with a number of veterinarians who wanted to get rid of sick and unwanted pets. The investigation exposed how sick and abandoned animals were being exploited for financial purposes and left to die in poorly-managed and unhygenic facilities.

In South Korea, there are animal shelters run or managed by local governments and those run by private entities. The former receive government funds and, therefore, must follow strict rules and regulations to ensure adequate care. This prevents these shelters from being undermaintained or carrying out illegal activities. However, the same does not apply to private animal shelters, which are free from government oversight and regulations. Many of these private animal shelters are underfunded and do not provide the same level of care. This lack of regulation and oversight allow illegal activity to occur within these shelters and the poor animals to be abused and exploited.

For these reasons, we request the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs to do the following:

1. Rescue animals from poorly-managed private animal shelters. Animals at these shelters reproduce at an exponential rate. Their babies either die in a couple of days or, even if they survive, cannot receive proper medical treatments and adequate care. When two or more animals are kept together, dead animals or infected animals must be immediately isolated from the others. However, proper treatment is not being provided, and the bodies of dead dogs and cats are left to decompose in the very same cage that contains other animals. Such cruel treatment is in violation of the Animal Protection Act and goes against the purpose of animal shelters that are supposed to provide a shelter and needed care for abandoned animals.

2. Create minimal standards for registering and managing private animal shelters. Animal hoarders continue to create new private animal shelters that hoard animals beyond their ability to manage and provide sufficient care for sick and abandoned animals.

Although not all personally owned animal shelters are poorly maintained, there is a need for stricter government regulations to be placed on these private facilities. Freedom is easy to use irresponsibly and there is a need to correct this. We request the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs to enforce strict regulations against private animal shelters so as to put an end to issues such as poor maintenance, illegal euthanasia, and theft of donated funds.