The practice of extracting bile from captive bears should be banned in China as soon as possible, a Chinese political advisor said on Friday.

" A timetable should be made to ban the practice in the shortest possible time," said Jia Baolan, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top advisory body.

Many black bears caged in farms in Fujian, Zhejiang, Shaanxi, Yunnan and Sichuan provinces are being cruelly treated, said Jia on the sidelines of the ongoing annual parliamentary session.

The political advisor urged the government to put black bears under top level state protection, and called for the formulation of a law on animal protection to conserve biodiversity in the country.

The government should also encourage farmers to exit from the bear bile extraction industry, and stop registration of bear bile-made medicine while encouraging research on alternatives of bear bile, Jia said.