--- title: Millions of Chinese Call For End to Yulin Dog Meat Festival description: Some 11 million Chinese have signed a petition demanding the abolition of the country's notorious Yulin Dog Meat Festival canonical: https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/ author: Charlie Campbell article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-15T06:17:37.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:59:54.972Z article:section: World og:title: Millions of Chinese Want the Yulin Dog Meat Festival to Stop og:description: But dog-meat traders have no intention of giving up the lucrative business og:url: https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c266d5c33fb2b5f/698897edcf40a85e8ac43a16/rtsgu8c.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Animal activists hold banners against Yulin Dog Meat Festival in front of Yulin City Representative office in Beijing og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Millions of Chinese Want the Yulin Dog Meat Festival to Stop twitter:description: But dog-meat traders have no intention of giving up the lucrative business twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c266d5c33fb2b5f/698897edcf40a85e8ac43a16/rtsgu8c.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Millions of Chinese Are Calling for an End to the Yulin Dog Meat Festival > Sponsored content. 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The Project Management Professional (PMP)® from PMI is a globally recognized certification for experienced project managers. For those newer to the field, PMI's Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)® is a common starting point. Other notable certifications include those focused on agile methodologies, such as the PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP)®, and program management certifications like the Program Management Professional (PgMP)®. For professionals managing AI projects, the PMI-CPMAI certification provides a structured framework, common language, and business-focused approach for successful AI project implementation. #### How does PMI support career growth for professionals? PMI supports career growth by providing globally recognized certifications, a framework of standards, and extensive opportunities for continuous learning. Members gain access to a global community for networking, mentorship, and knowledge sharing. The organization also produces research and thought leadership on emerging trends, helping professionals stay current with skills in areas like AI, agile practices, and strategic business management. These resources are designed to help professionals at all levels enhance their skills and advance their careers. #### What is the PMBOK® Guide? The PMBOK® Guide, or A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, is PMI’s foundational guide to generally accepted project management knowledge and practice. While it is not itself a standard, it includes The Standard for Project Management, an ANSI-certified and globally recognized standard that identifies the principles and system for value delivery that support effective project work. 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The PMP is for experienced project managers and requires a combination of formal education and years of documented project leadership experience, making it a more advanced and globally recognized certification. #### How does PMI support social impact? PMI supports social impact by helping individuals, nonprofits, NGOs, and communities use project management to turn purpose into measurable outcomes. Through the PMI Educational Foundation, PMI expands access to project management education for youth worldwide, including underserved and underrepresented populations. Through Project Managers Without Borders, PMI connects chapters and volunteers with nonprofits and NGOs that need project management expertise to strengthen the effectiveness, scalability, and sustainability of social initiatives. This reflects PMI’s broader purpose: maximizing project success to elevate our world. ### Sources * Project Management Institute | [pmi.org](/c/pmi-2026-q3/home?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, "Earning Power: Project Management Salary Survey—Fourteenth Edition" | [pmi.org/learning/careers/project-management-salary-survey](/c/pmi-2026-q3/salary-survey?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, "Global Project Management Talent Gap" | [pmi.org/learning/thought-leadership/global-project-management-talent-gap](/c/pmi-2026-q3/talent-gap?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, "Maximizing Project Success" | [pmi.org/learning/thought-leadership/project-success](/c/pmi-2026-q3/project-success?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, “Pulse Report 2025: Boosting Business Acumen” | [pmi.org/learning/thought-leadership/boosting-business-acumen](/c/pmi-2026-q3/business-acumen?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, “Pulse of the Profession® 2026: Driving Success in Complex Projects” | [pmi.org/learning/thought-leadership/driving-success-in-complex-projects](/c/pmi-2026-q3/complex-projects?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI, “Step Up: Redefining the Path to Project Success with M.O.R.E.” | [pmi.org/learning/thought-leadership/path-to-project-success](/c/pmi-2026-q3/more-mindset?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) * PMI Education Foundation, PMIEF 2024 Annual Report, [pmi.org PMIEF 2024 Annual Report (PDF)](/c/pmi-2026-q3/pmief-report?i=6e42abe8-4fa5-4f2f-9d01-009e49fa00ed&cr=agentads-creative-pmi-v1) ### FAQ structured data (JSON-LD, optional)  by [Charlie Campbell / Beijing](https://time.com/author/charlie-campbell/)  ## Charlie Campbell / Beijing Editor at Large Jun 15, 2016 6:17 AM UTC  Animal-rights activists hold banners protesting against the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in front of the Yulin government offices in Beijing on June 10, 2016 Animal-rights activists hold banners protesting against the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in front of the Yulin government offices in Beijing on June 10, 2016Kim Kyung Hoon —Reuters  by [Charlie Campbell / Beijing](https://time.com/author/charlie-campbell/)  ## Charlie Campbell / Beijing Editor at Large Jun 15, 2016 6:17 AM UTC Hei-hei is 3 years old. She loves snoozing spread-eagled on her back, playing with a football, and sausages. She hates early morning exercise and, clichés be damned, cats — especially that sandy-colored rascal who is forever prowling our roof. And were she not rescued from a construction site as a puppy, Hei-hei may well have now have been eaten. My wife and I recently adopted Hei-hei from the [TACN rescue center](http://tacn.org) on the outskirts of Beijing. Like practically all the animals there, she was destined for China’s dog-meat trade. An [estimated](http://alceehastings.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=398626) 10 million dogs are devoured across China each year, including around 10,000 that end up at the infamous Yulin Dog Meat Festival, which kicks off once again on June 21 in Guangxi. But perhaps not for long. Last Friday, dozens of protesters gathered at the Yulin government offices in Beijing to present a petition of 11 million signatures demanding the festival’s abolition. “Yulin is a total embarrassment to China,” says Xu Yufeng, founder of Beijing Mothers Against Animal Cruelty. The event should end, she added, “in the interests of public security, food safety, social morality and China’s reputation.” Every culture has its culinary peccadillos, and China has a long history of eating dogs. The practice predates written annals, and even the craftsmen who created the famed Terracotta Army were partial, according to a new [study](http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/1969934/craftsmen-who-built-chinas-terracotta-army-ate-dogs-study). It is a habit mirrored in other Asian nations — from Cambodia and Vietnam to Korea. Traditionally, dogs are eaten for medicinal qualities, as their meat is supposed to stoke the body’s _yang_ energy. At Yulin, there’s also a superstition about bringing good fortune at the summer solstice. “Dogs are no different than other livestock, and dog meat is nutritious,” one Beijing dog farmer and butcher, who sells about 50 kg of dog meat a day to restaurants and private households, tells TIME. “I think we should eat dogs, which are just farm animals, like pigs.” China has less than 100 recognized dog farms, most of which are very small, [s](http://www.animalsasia.org/us/media/news/news-archive/chinese-dog-meat-trade-uncovered.html)[ay](http://www.animalsasia.org/us/media/news/news-archive/chinese-dog-meat-trade-uncovered.html) animal-rights activists, keeping around 30 adult dogs at any one time to prevent the incidence and spread of diseases. The above farmer, who asks to remain anonymous, keeps just 50 young and mature animals, and says it takes six or seven months until dogs are ready for slaughter. This tiny capacity means that the vast majority of the canines eaten in China are strays and pilfered pets (warning: [distressing link](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pDJGLrxUeI)). Dog owners across the country have to be on red alert for snatch thieves in the run-up to Yulin. While eating dog has ancient roots, Yulin’s supporters can’t pretend that the festival has precedent. The event only started in the 1990s and isn’t official — the local authorities even [deny](http://www.yulin.gov.cn/info/300888) there is a festival as such. Instead, they say it’s simply an informal gathering of like-minded individuals. Dogs are bludgeoned to death on the spot, and then eaten with an accompaniment of lychees and grain alcohol. China’s growing affluence, however, is quickly changing it into a nation of dog lovers, not eaters. To be sure, in harsher times dogs were either a source food or protection — but now they increasingly kept for companionship. Day or night, our quiet Beijing street teems with handsome pedigrees, including a silky black labrador, a couple of imperious corgis and an enormous Siberian husky. (Such breeds, being over 35 cm tall, are technically illegal inside the city center, though the authorities evidently turn one heck of a blind eye.) Our Hei-hei — a Pekingese cross, we believe — looks quite the cur in such well-bred circles. “Dogs are humans’ friends. They safeguard people and even rescue people. Having dogs also helps children with autism,” says an anti-Yulin protester, Qi Qi, 33, holding a rescued black poodle called Nu-nu. “And dogs need to be cared for and vaccinated.”  People eat dog meat at a dog-meat restaurant district during the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in the Chinese city of Yulin, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, on June 22, 2015 Kim Kyung Horn—Reuters The preening, affection and potentially deleterious rule flouting exhibited by China’s urban pet owners is hard to reconcile with the barbarity of Yulin. Thousands of distressed animals are packed into sweltering crates, at the very zenith of the summer inferno, and transported in journeys that can last days to the southern city of 7 million. Many are dead on arrival. Rabies, which kills around 100 Chinese each year, is a major concern. Dogs are responsible for 9 out of 10 cases in China. Eating strays and pets at Yulin, with no clue as to their origin or health, is worse than scavenging roadkill. Protesters have had some success before. In 2011, Chinese authorities [banned](http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/09/24/china-bans-ancient-dog-eating-festival-amid-online-outcry/) the Jinhua Hutou Dog Meat Festival in Zhejiang province. That festival dated back six centuries and was rooted in commemoration of a legendary battle, yet it was nixed because of the public outcry. Yulin could be stopped if [current laws](http://english.agri.gov.cn/governmentaffairs/lr/ie/201305/t20130509%5F19615.htm), which prohibit the mass transportation of live animals without prior laboratory quarantine, were implemented. Currently, the trucks that arrive in Yulin are waved through. (China has a draft animal-welfare law but it’s not yet been passed.) According to Professor Guo Peng, an expert in the dog-meat trade at Shandong University, the Yulin government has repeatedly ignored regulation violations she has personally brought to their attention, though it has taken some measures to reduce the tension caused by the festival. “The Yulin government is a local regulator of a remote area,” she says, “I’m not sure of the \[central\] government’s power of execution.” Instead, activists are taking the lead. On Wednesday, the Humane Society International (HSI) said it had rescued 29 dogs and five cats from a slaughterhouse in Yulin. “Once they realized we weren’t there to hurt them, but in fact we would make their suffering stop at last, they very quickly responded with licks and wagging tails,” said Peter Li, HSI’s China policy specialist. Even so, and despite Chinese new affection for man’s best friend, Yulin, and the dog-meat trade in general, will be hard to stamp out while it remains so lucrative. “Most of the dog meat is from stolen dogs, so there is no cost in breeding and the price is lower than pork and lamb, leading to a high profit margin,” adds Guo. “It is difficult for the government to stop the chasing of profit.” — _With reporting by Zhang Chi / Beijing_ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/"},"headline":"Millions of Chinese Are Calling for an End to the Yulin Dog Meat Festival","datePublished":"2016-06-15T06:17:37.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:59:54.972Z","description":"Huge numbers have signed a petition against the event, but traders who make large profits from dog meat show no intention of giving up the business","url":"https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/","keywords":["China","eating","Festival"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c266d5c33fb2b5f/698897edcf40a85e8ac43a16/rtsgu8c.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Charlie Campbell / Beijing"}],"articleSection":"World","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c266d5c33fb2b5f/698897edcf40a85e8ac43a16/rtsgu8c.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Animal activists hold banners against Yulin Dog Meat Festival in front of Yulin City Representative office in Beijing","caption":"Animal activists hold banners against Yulin Dog Meat Festival in front of Yulin City Representative office in Beijing","creditText":"Kim Kyung Hoon —Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/world/","name":"World"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4363824/yulin-dog-meat-festival-china-petition/","name":"Millions of Chinese Are Calling for an End to the Yulin Dog Meat Festival"}}]}] ```