There are still some countries which do not have any animal cruelty laws. In the 21st century that’s a disgrace. The country with the world’s second largest economy, China, is one of those countries which are a disgrace in terms of its failure to enact animal welfare laws. Other countries with no laws against animal cruelty are: Angola, Belarus, Congo, Eritrea, Iran, Mongolia, Madagascar, Vietnam and Mozambique. The list is not comprehensive. These are examples.
It is particularly timely and relevant to discuss this boring (to some) topic now because if China had decent animal welfare laws it is likely that the current devastating coronavirus pandemic would not have occurred. Think about it: for the sake of one day’s work cutting and pasting an effective animal welfare law from one country to China’s legislature would have saved the world.
Can you cut and past the entire animal welfare law legislation of one country into the laws of another? I think you can if the law is written in general terms as is the Animal Welfare Act 2006. If you don’t like it try Sweden’s or any other version that is well written and effective. Every state in the US has great animal welfare law.
Cutting and pasting law been done before and it was ridiculed by the press but I like it. It is far better to have a cut and pasted law that protects animals than no law at all. That’s obvious.
In response to the coronavirus pandemic Nigeria produced their own version of an infectious diseased act by cutting and pasting Singapore’s version: the Infectious Diseases Act 1977. They say it’s plagiarism. It’s not really – come one, let’s get real. It is common sense. Nigeria’s new coronavrius legislation is 98 percentage the same as Singapore’s. Nigeria’s speaker of the House of Representatives is unabashed. She said that it was:
…reasonable for parliamentarians to look elsewhere for existing legislation that deals with similar policy goals.
I agree. It is wise to take tried and tested legislation from one country and use it in another country, lock stock and barrel if needs be, because it saves time and it gets the job done. Doing it is the hard part.
The next big task for Nigeria is to make sure their new law is enforced properly. You can’t cut and paste that.
