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New York City Bans Sale of Foie Gras

The ban on the luxury food product will take effect in 2022.

The New York City Council has voted to ban the sale of foie gras—a staple item in French fine dining—from the city beginning in 2022, The New York Times reports. The council overwhelmingly voted to ban the sale of the fattened duck or goose liver over animal cruelty concerns. Ducks are force-fed a corn-based mixture through tubes to engorge their livers in a 20-day regimen. The process makes the ducks too big to walk or even breathe before they die, according to animal activists. “This is one of the most violent practices and it’s done for a purely luxury product,” Manhattan councilwoman Carlina Rivera said. However, foie gras farmers claim accusations of cruelty are exaggerated and said there was bias against their product due to its luxury connotation. While over 1,000 restaurants in New York City currently serve foie gras, a greater impact could be felt in New York farms that can no longer sell the product to such a large market. California recently banned the item along with other countries, like India, Israel and Britain. Chicago also banned the sale of foie gras in 2006, but The Chicago Tribune reports that the ban was reversed two years later.