Calling on Dutch e-commerce giant to stop selling kangaroo products

By selling kangaroo products, Bol.com contributes to the largest commercial slaughter of land-dwelling wild mammals on earth. More than 90 million kangaroos have been shot in the last 30 years.  

Kangaroos are often shot from a great distance in the dark. An estimated up to 40 percent of shots are not immediately fatal. The kangaroos sometimes have to be shot several times before they are killed. If they escape, they can die a painful and slow death from the gunshot wound.  

Joeys are sometimes still in their mothers' pouches and are killed by blunt force or left to their own devices.  

World Animal Protection, campaign manager for the Netherlands, Sanne Kuijpers said:   

“Webshop Bol.com sells products on a large scale for which wild kangaroos have been shot in Australia. The kangaroo hunt is extremely cruel: the kangaroos are often not killed in one go and die a long, painful death.” 

“By selling kangaroo products, companies contribute to this. We therefore call on Dutch companies, and in the first instance Bol.com, to stop this.' 

The Netherlands is one of the largest importers of kangaroo products. The meat ends up in restaurants, at butchers or is processed into pet food. And the leather is used to make skates, shoes, hats and other fashion items. But the tide is turning against kangaroo cruelty.  

Other retail brands have already decided to stop offering kangaroo meat and products including Delhaize, Carrefour, Makro and Spar.  Recently, Kiezebrink, BB Quality and Boomsma decided to follow suit after contacting World Animal Protection about the cruelty of kangaroo hunting.

Health and species conservation risks 

In addition to the gross animal welfare violations in kangaroo hunting, there are more reasons to ban kangaroo products. For example, the consumption of kangaroo meat entails health risks: in recent years, pathogens have been regularly discovered on the meat, such as Salmonella and E.coli. 

Under the guise of population management, the Australian government sets a quota every year for the (commercial) shooting of kangaroos. However, the calculation for the quota and dates are extremely dubious. For example, the low reproductive rate of kangaroos and factors such as drought, fires and habitat loss are not taken into account. 

It's time to leave kangaroos in the wild - where they belong.