An ongoing dog meat festival in Guangxi province in Southern China has triggered protests from dog lovers and animal rights advocates in the country and abroad.

The dog meat fest is a traditional celebration of the Chinese culture. The festival has opened in Guangxi province in southern China.

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The yearly "Lychee Dog Meat Festival" summer tradition held in Yulin is celebrated by eating dog meat, lychees and drinking liquor. There are about 10,000 dogs slaughtered for the event wherein many of the animals were electrocuted, skinned to death and burned, reported ChinaSmack.

Some of these dog meats are hooked and displayed on the side of the roads, according to various images posted online. The report from ChinaSmack went on saying that in China, dog meat is considered a healthy food, treating illnesses and improving blood circulation, and that some doctors even prescribe its consumption.

Online protests in social media platforms, including photo sharing app Instagram and microblogging site Sina Weibo, have been rapidly increasing. Even celebrities voiced opposition against the dog meat festival and deemed the event as cruel and gruesome.

Chinese celebrity Yang Mi's post on Weibo opposing dog meat eating in the country in reference to the customary festival has been the third most popular post of the week.

On the other hand, a post circulating on social media with an image of a dog with a red teardrop calls for the scheduled dog meat festival to be stopped.

Dog meat eating is not only a Chinese custom but also present in other countries including Japan and Korea. The 2008 records show that there were about five tonnes of dog meat from China exported to Japan for Korean and Chinese restaurants operating in the country.

Currently, dog meat eating in the United States and Europe is no longer rampant while the number of consumption in Korea and Japan has also declined following the economic development and the advancement of the way of life in each country.

This has led people in these territories to keep dogs as pets and not for food consumption, reported Guangzhou's Time Weekly.

Meanwhile, records have shown a sharp decline in dog meat consumption in the middle class and younger generation in the country.

TagsDog Meat Festival, Yulin Dog Meat Festival, Lychee Dog Meat Festival, Instagram, Yang Mi, Guangxi Province