Official figures from China's civil affairs department show that over 1.7 million couples porced in China in 2009, up more than 10 percent on the previous year. And those figures include only those couples porced by civil affairs departments, meaning those porced in court were not included. That hike is more than the 9 percent increase in the marriage rate, although overall the number of marriages - almost 11 and half million - far exceeded porces.

Still, over the past three years, the year-on-year growth rate of registered porces was higher than the growth rate of registered marriages. And the number of porces in absolute terms has rocketed from just over 500,000 at the beginning of the century to today’s figure of more than three times as much. Given this seemingly unstoppable rise we went out and asked ordinary Chinese people what they think more people are getting porced.

China's demand for tiger skins and other products is one of the major reasons the big cats are so critically endangered.

But now in zoos across the nation, tigers are being traded in the hope their population will increase.

BON's Andrew Livingstone has the details.