Close Canidrome Greyhound Racing Track in Macau

Help close down the infamous Canidrome greyhound racing track

Australian greyhounds, shockingly, are live exported to China to race in Macau, the only place in Asia with a greyhound track. When not racing, the dogs live in small cages onsite. Even more ghastly is the fact that not a single Australian dog sent to Macau comes out alive at the end of their career – there is simply no adoption program to make this possible.  Dogs are killed when their performances start to decline, usually before the age of five.

This has been an issue fought by greyhound protection groups for years. In fact, Animal Liberation Qld Directors met with then Federal Agriculture Minister, Joe Ludwig, in July 2012, asking for his support to ban the exportation of greyhounds to China. The Minister was quite unsympathetic, merely stating that the fate of the exported dogs differed little from what he had been reliably informed was the fate of most greyhounds raced in Australia.

But fast forward to 2015 and there is now a glimmer of hope that greyhound racing can be stopped at the Canidrome.  The Canidrome's land lease expires on October 31, and with this uncertainty around its future comes an excellent opportunity for greyhound advocates worldwide to pressure Macau into closing the track. 

Join with the rest of the world to help close the Canidrome

Here’s how: Macau’s Chief Executive, Chui Sai On, will decide on the future of the track.  A worldwide campaign headed by GREY2K USA is asking greyhound advocates to do these things:

1. Join the worldwide candlelight vigil on September 30. Take a photo holding a candle and a sign with the hashtag #CloseTheCanidrome and give the reason you feel so strongly about saving the dogs. Then post this photo on all of your social media networks! 

     Please tag us and our friends at GREY2K USA: 

  • Twitter - @animallibqld and @GREY2KUSA
  • Facebook - Animal Liberation Queensland and GREY2K USA
  • Instagram - @animallibqld

2. Email your photo to Macau Chief Executive Chui Sai On at [email protected] and politely ask him to close the Canidrome and end the suffering of greyhounds in Macau.

3. Take part in an earlier candlelight vigil at Redcliffe north of Brisbane on Sunday 27 September (the weekend preceding the worldwide vigil on Wednesday September 30.)  

4. Ask your MP to stop allowing Australian greyhounds to be exported to Macau.

5. Sign GREY2K USA's petition to Close the Canidrome.

We look forward to your support to help close the Canidrome. 

Background: 

Macau is a small peninsula in mainland China, across the Pearl River Delta from Hong Kong. Its giant casinos and extravagant malls have earned it the nickname, the "Las Vegas of Asia."

According to Albano Martins, the chief of Macau-based animal shelter Anima and a former financier, “The revenue the Canidrome made in the whole of 2014, a casino can make in just four hours.” The Canidrome clearly is not important to Macau’s economy, giving more credence to the push to close it down.

A 2011 investigation by the South China Morning Post revealed the Canidrome killed 383 underperforming dogs in 2010 instead of making efforts to rehome them, triggering a global backlash. Albano Martins claimed last year that an ‘adoption program’ supposedly implemented under government orders in response to the backlash is nothing but a scam.

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