The right move
How encouraging sometimes people and large organizations will take the right stand and go the right direction. If a stand is taken it will have a domino effect, sometimes slow, but still takes effect. I am very happy to see what Carrefour is doing to contribute to saving animals. Congratulations to WWF as it has scored another victory.
Tsem Rinpoche
Carrefour joins shark fin boycott in Singapore
(AFP) – 07 January 2012
SINGAPORE — French retail giant Carrefour will halt sales of shark fin products in its Singapore outlets after current stocks run out as a supermarket boycott of the delicacy gains steam, media reported Saturday.
A Carrefour spokesman told the Straits Times it will not replenish its stocks of the environmentally controversial products after they sell out.
The company is the world’s second-largest retailer and operates two supermarkets in Singapore’s city centre.
It told the paper the decision was made on its own initiative as a socially responsible retailer, but it could not be reached for comment on whether the ban would extend to its other outlets worldwide.
Shark fin remains a sought after delicacy in Singapore, where it is largely served at Chinese festive celebrations and wedding receptions.
According to the conservation group WWF, the city-state is the world’s second largest shark fin trading centre after Hong Kong.
WWF-Hong Kong says the consumption of shark fins is a driving factor behind the threat to shark populations, with more than 180 species considered threatened in 2010 compared to only 15 in 1996.
The Carrefour report came a day after Singapore’s largest supermarket chain NTUC FairPrice declared it was halting sales of shark fin products.
NTUC FairPrice — a cooperative run by the city-state’s national trades union — said it would drop the products from April after an inflammatory comment by one of its suppliers attracted a flurry of complaints.
The supplier had said “Screw the divers!” in an online promotional message for a new product to be launched at FairPrice outlets during the upcoming Lunar New Year.
The comment, apparently directed at divers campaigning against the shark fin trade, went viral on Facebook and microblogging site Twitter.
Retailer Cold Storage was the first Singapore chain to stop selling shark fin, which it did in September last year as part of a collaboration with WWF, local media reported.
Source: http://www.nst.com.my/latest/carrefour-joins-shark-fin-boycott-in-singapore-1.29065
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Good to hear that one of the biggest hypermarket in Singapore support NO shark fin product. This will surely bring more awareness and of the cruelty of killing sharks for the pleasure of eating the fins.
When more people stop eating shark fins, demand will naturally drop and supply will be stop too. May more restaurants, hoteliers and market support this virtues act.
This is good news to know that such an international retail supermarket Carrefour has followed the footsteps of NTUC FairPrice and Cold Storage to stop selling shark fin products. Some hotels and restaurants have taken the initiative as a socially responsible retailer and removed shark fin from their menu. Consumers must also play their part by not buying this product. If the buying stops, the killing stops too.
Well, the Sharksfin soup is delicious but having the fin in it or not does not really make a difference to the soup. The gelatinous strips of the sharksfin is basically tasteless and can be easily replicated with something that’s vegetarian. This is fantastic news for Shark’s fin campaigners but it would be as big as when large retailers stop the selling of meat produce and up the variety of vegetables instead.
That would be great news and another alternative would be the mass production of stem cell-grown meat. You know, basically meat that was grown from stem cells. I think that’s still alright? I don’t think little cells can suffer and feel pain right? I dunno, I may be wrong but that’s how I see it. I am not sure about other moralistic and scientific implications but that would be a better bet to lessen the suffering of animals because being totally vegetarian would be a harder standpoint to work from. However, I am not sure of how far off we are to developing such a technology but it is an easier dream when compared to getting everybody vegetarian.
Nowadays more and more people have come to understand that shark fins are just another meal that can so easily replaced by more delicious dishes with better nutrients and tastes, although clearly, much education is needed especially in some countries where old thinkings remain.
I have seen more and more cases of wedding functions choosing to take out shark fins soup and replace them with some dishes similar in look and tastes. Good sight indeed.
With changing of this mindset, we are helping to reduce the sufferings of those sharks which we kill just for their fins for a few minutes of our enjoyment.
I thank Rinpoche for showing me how cruel I was for not being a vegetarian. I didn’t think of any reason to become a vegetarian until i watched Earthlings. I treat the food on my plate solely food, but now i understand, the food(meat) on my plate is not just a piece of meat but it is the life of an animal.
Be a vegetarian 🙂 Animals deserve love. If you can’t give them love, but at least don’t be the reason of suffering for them.
This is great news! Bit by bit…people will start to realize that eating sharks fin do NOT bring benefits nor make you healthy…I saw it on the TV….how they threw the sharks back into the water! Aaarrrrrgghhh… How can they do that? How about cutting 1 of your limb and throwing you out on the street bleeding? So sad… I pray that more retailers will support WWF in this act.
Such a GREAT GREAT NEWS!!!! ^^,
It is so touched when I heard this great news. I can imagine how many shark will be safe if this second largest supermarket continue stop retailing all those shark products. Especially Chinese New Year just nearby at the corner, the demand of shark fin is really scary.
I sincerely hope everyone of us not order鱼翅(yu chi)for your dinner while you enjoy your new year at home with your lovely family member.
Anyone miss shark fin? Come to Kechara Oasis and we will serve you shark fin soup without having to kill any sharks.
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Sometimes we worry about Rinpoche’s health.While we know deep inside that worrying is not going to do anything except make us more sad, there are times when irrational worries tend to drive rational thought to the far corners of my mind! So… please take care of your health, Rinpoche, and enjoy this music/mantra: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4e9hcqVVfY&feature=related
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CPD team (Portugal)
Kill a shark for the fin. I think we are cruel to eat shark fin. There was no scientific proof that shark fin bring any benefits to human’s health.
If more and more big retail stores have these campaign going on, we actually educate the consumer the “bad image” of consuming food that bring cruelty to animals. Just like the smoking campaign, century ago, smoking is a signature to rich, glamous image. In today world, it kind of represent bringing bad health to body and “bad image” to those smoker.
Thanks to Cold Storage, the first s’pore chain to stop selling shark fin in last september as part of a collaboration with WWF. Next on the compassionate move was NTUC FAIRPRICE, which drop the sale of this product from April, “after an inflammatory comment by one of its suppliers which attracted a flurry of complaints”. Then followed by Carefour which joined the spore Shark fin Boycott, with the “decision made on its own initiative as a responsible retailer”. How compassionately generous that all these three kind giant-chains have done towards saving the animal beings. Congratulations to WWF and may these three giant-chains be well blessed for their kind moves!
Kudos to S’pore retail giants – Cold Storage, Carrefour and NTUC FairPrice – for activating a domino effect to stop the sale of sharks’ fins. It is to be hoped that the domino effect will escalate and soon there will be few if any retail outlet selling sharks’fins.
However, ultimately it’s the consumers themselves who must realize how terribly horrendous it is that they are eating fins which have been just hacked off the poor sharks which are then thrown back into the ocean to suffer a slow and terribly painful death.
All beings have the right to live, not just humans.
Thank you Carrefour for taking such a noble step to safe the shark. Carrefour set a good example for others. We should safe the animals, not kill the animal to celebrate Lunar new year in order to accumulate merits for a blessed year ahead. OM MANI PEDME HUNG.
It is indeed a great news for saving the animals. My friend who used to work in the Chinese Restaurant, easily they can slaughter 1000 over fishes excluding other animals during Chinese new year, so many animals were being killed just to serve our desire to taste and food.
Carrefour set a good example to other stores. Some might say how about other animal product? But it is better to start somewhere than do nothing about it at all. Yes, Kudos to Carrefour.
This is great news. However, we need to realize that ultimately Consumers have the power and if concerned individuals make a firm stance on important issues, and make sure their stance is heard and understood, it will initiate a powerful domino effect. A couple of years ago Citibank HK canceled a “sharks fin” promotion when some cardholders complained and canceled their Citibank cards in protest. Businesses cannot afford to ignore their customer’s stance on environmental and animal cruelty issues.
At the heart of the issue is the fact that there are still demand for sharks fin, meat from slaughtered animals and products that involve cruel animal testing. WildAid hit the nail on the head when they chose the tagline “When the buying stops, the killing can too”.
It is a such a great news that a corporate retailer take initiative in halting the sales of shark fin, it surely will encourage more other retailer to understand the issue of the endangered population of shark due to mass slaughtering for a delicacy which until today has no proof of nutritional benefits.
If corporate company could come together and educate the public on saving shark, educate them with the information of mercury contamination from consuming shark fin, it will sure will allow more people to understand it. It’s not easy, but slowly people will realize.
Kudos to Carrefour for this effort and being socially responsible in saving animal, hope to hear more corporate company will join hand in commencing such a move as well.