Bill Text: HI HB2296 | 2012 | Regular Session | Amended

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Bill Title: Exotic Animals; Bears; Prohibitions

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 5-0)

Status: (Passed) 2012-06-15 - (S) Act 126, 6/15/2012 (Gov. Msg. No. 1228). [HB2296 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2012-HB2296-Amended.html

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STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3145

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    H.B. No. 2296

       H.D. 1

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Shan S. Tsutsui

President of the Senate

Twenty-Sixth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2012

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committee on Judiciary and Labor, to which was referred H.B. No. 2296, H.D. 1, entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO ANIMAL WELFARE,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to prohibit the selling, buying, transporting, delivering, offering for sale or transportation, or receiving for transportation in intrastate commerce, any product, item, or substance containing, labeled, or advertised as containing bear gallbladders or bile.

 

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawaiian Humane Society, The Humane Society of the United States, Born Free USA, Species Survival Network, and twenty-three private individuals.

 

     Your Committee finds that the methods of extracting bear bile are horrendously inhumane.  Bears are commonly kept in extraction cages that measure 2.6 feet by 4.4 feet by 6.5 feet for a bear weighing between one hundred ten to two hundred sixty pounds.  These cages prevent the bears from standing upright and severely restrict their movement.  The process for extracting the bile involves pushing a hollow steel catheter through the bear's abdomen to "milk" the bile out of the bear.

 

     Despite this inhumane treatment, bear gallbladders and their bile byproduct are used in Asia and the United States to create medicines and some luxury cosmetic items and toiletries.  The high worldwide demand for bear gallbladder and bile translates into a high-profit industry.  According to testimony, Hawaii is one of the few states that still allows the trade of bear gallbladders taken from bears outside of the State.  Your Committee notes that products containing bear bile were found available for sale in Honolulu Chinatown at $500 for approximately twenty-eight grams.  By prohibiting commercial activities involving any product, item, or substance containing bear gallbladder or bile, this measure allows Hawaii to join the other states that have fully banned this trade.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Clarifying that the purchase, sale, transportation, and delivery in commerce, rather than just intrastate commerce, of any product, item, or substance containing, labeled, or advertised as containing bear gallbladders or bile is prohibited; and

 

     (2)  Changing the effective date from January 7, 2059, to upon approval.

 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary and Labor that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2296, H.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2296, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Judiciary and Labor,

 

		____________________________ CLAYTON HEE, Chair