Don't eat kangaroos, Steve Irwin's dad urges China

SYDNEY — The father of late Australian conservationist Steve Irwin urged China on Wednesday not to start importing kangaroo meat, warning it could wipe out huge stocks of the animal.

Bob Irwin made his plea after Australia's kangaroo industry began courting the giant Asian market in the wake of Russia's move to bar imports.

"We wouldn't eat your pandas, so please don't eat our kangaroos. Come and see them," Irwin said.

Irwin, whose "Crocodile Hunter" son was killed in a freak stingray accident in 2006, said kangaroos held more value as a tourist attraction than as meat with the country's stocks now "critical."

"The Chinese are one of our biggest visitors and kangaroos are one of their favourite attractions. If they were to start eating kangaroos, we predict that within a few years there won't be any left in the wild for them to see," Irwin said.

Kangaroo Industry Association of Australia executive officer John Kelly told AFP last month that exports to China were expected to start in the first half of next year.

Russia, a major export market, barred kangaroo meat from August 1 along with meat products from a host of other countries, citing sanitary concerns.

"They're slow breeders and the numbers are critical at the moment so we're terrified at what happens if China opens their door to it," Australia Society for Kangaroos coordinator Nikki Sutterby said.

"We're trying to get the buying public and the international community to boycott it like they have done with seals and other barbaric trades."

Sutterby said kangaroos often suffer painful deaths as they are hunted in the wild rather than farmed, adding that their young, known as joeys, are routinely beaten to death.