Jill Robinson

Jill Robinson MBE is an English animal welfare activist. She is the founder of Animals Asia Foundation.

Biography

Born and raised in England, Robinson was always interested in the welfare of animals. As a child she volunteered in veterinary offices during her school holidays. In the mid-1980s she moved to Hong Kong, where she began working for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, focusing on work in China and South Korea.

In 1993, Robinson visited a bear bile farm in China. According to Robinson, at the time approximately 10,000 Asiatic black bears were caged at farms similar to this one, in conditions many animal welfare groups consider horrific. At bear bile farms, bile is extracted from the bear's gallbladder for use in traditional Chinese medicines. For the next seven years, Robinson researched the way bile was used and negotiated with the Chinese government. In 2000, the Sichuan Forestry Department signed a pledge with the China Wildlife Conservation Association to release 500 bears from the bile farms with the worst conditions. This marked the first time an agency of the Chinese government had come to an official agreement with an animal welfare organization.

In 2017, Robinson announced an MOU alongside the Deputy General Director of the Vietnam Administration of Forestry, Cao Chi Cong, to end bear bile farming in Vietnam by 2020 and to work together to rescue the remaining 1,000 bears still in cages.

Robinson has also been a proponent of the Doctor Dog program, which rescues stray dogs in Asia and trains them to participate in animal-assisted therapy.

Awards Jill Robinson has received numerous distinctions for her commitment to animal welfare, including: 2025 - Explorers Club 50 (EC50) 2002 - Genesis Award; in 2005 - the Reader's Digest Hero for Today Award; and in 1998 - MBE by Queen Elizabeth in the Birthday Honours List, in recognition of her services to animal welfare in Asia. In 2018 - Robinson was noted in the book, Rescuing Ladybugs by author and animal advocate Jennifer Skiff as having "ignited a movement in Asia" after being physically and emotionally touched by an imprisoned moon bear being used for bile extraction in Zhuhai, China.