As more than one billion animals have lost their lives in the on-going Australian fires, the country’s government yet again initiated and tried to justify its horrific plan to shoot thousands of camels by using the ridiculous excuse that camels are drinking too much water! Please urge the Australian government to put an immediate and permanent end to this cruel practice.
The 5,000+ terrified camels needlessly and horrifically gunned down earlier this month were hit with hails of bullets shot from the sky using helicopters and from the ground while chased by trucks in the arid central Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) region of Australia. Herds of camels roamed into rural communities in the region in a desperate search for water amidst drought, extreme heat, and the on-going bushfires which have already claimed the lives of approximately one billion animals.
Mass camel executions have been done many times over the years in regions throughout Australia with the end result always being the same: more camels. Kills are short-sighted and monstrously cruel, leaving many camels to suffer for hours or days after being wounded, but not killed outright. They are also very expensive and ineffective, as they do not offer long-term, sustainable solutions to water conservation issues.
Kills fail to address the real cause of water shortages, which is human-caused livestock water consumption. Human ranchers are killing all sorts of wild animals so that they can’t “compete with them for resources like grass or water” or “prey upon” the animals that they breed into existence and then kill for their flesh. Then the ranchers are blaming wild animals like camels and kangaroos for problems that they themselves created in the first place.
Livestock in Australia consume nearly half of the country’s agricultural water supply. The livestock industry must be first curtailed and then eliminated to conserve as much water as possible. People must also be encouraged to adopt plant-based diets, which will save enough water to hydrate the entire continent, including the poor unfairly vilified camels.
What You Can Do
Please send our letter to the Executive Board Members of Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara, the key South Australia government officials responsible for funding the killing at the Department of Environment and Water, and the Senior Media Advisor for South Australia to urge for a permanent end to all camel kills and to request that the actual causes of water shortages in Australia are addressed.
Featured image: a wild camel in Australia. Image credit esia_one, CC By-SA 2.0.
