The fur industry is a heavily-supervised one. Breeding and trapping conditions are governed by European directives, transposed into national laws, and by international agreements. Even the fur industry has rules intended to improve its image with consumers who are increasingly demanding. Despite all of this, animal welfare is far from guaranteed and respected. There are still massive differences between producing countries.
European directive 38/58 deals with this. It establishes the rules for breeding all animals, whether for meat or fur. The conditions under which animals are slaughtered are governed by another directive from 1993. What do these texts say ? That animals in farms must not “suffer hunger and thirst”», “physical distress”, that they must be kept free of “fear and distress” or even, when the time comes for the animal to be slaughtered “any needless suffering or pain during transport, housing, immobilisation, stunning, slaughter or killing".
The law does not help to preserve welfare
According to a European Union study – The welfare of animals kept for fur production –, produced by a Scientific Committee in 2001, farming and slaughter conditions are desperate. The cages where the animals are held for example do not meet their physiological needs. Some of the recommendations in the report leave us to think that either the law is not applied or respected or that it does not help to preserve animal welfare. For example, do we need to remind farmers that they must treat injured animals ?
A text that provides no restrictions
As for trapping, Europe banned it in 1991 under pressure from animal protection associations. For exports, the first reference text was signed in 1997 with Canada and Russia and in August 1998 with the United States. This agreement, called the Agreement on international standards for cruelty-free trapping (ANIPSC), specifies that fur exports may continue in the EU as long as leg-hold traps are banned from 2001. It defines strict rules and imposes scientific tests to ensure that traps meet animal "welfare" standards and guarantee minimal suffering.
It also provides for the creation of new, more "humane" trapping methods that were supposed to be used at the latest in 2007. But the text does not really put any restrictions on trappers: “Even if welfare may vary considerably, the term "cruelty-free" is only applied to trapping methods that maintain animals’ welfare at a sufficient level, although it is accepted that in certain situations, in the case of traps intended to kill animals, the welfare level may be low for a short period of time". If this agreement was ratified in 1999 by the EU and Canada, we had to wait until 22nd July 2008 for Russia to ratify it in turn and be subject to the same rules, notably for testing the conformity of their traps with ISO standards.
The rules change from one country to another
The rules vary from country to country. They may even differ within the EU. Several countries in Europe have taken measures to restrict or ban fur farms. Since 2003 the United Kingdom has ban all breeding of animals for fur. Fox and chinchilla farms are banned in the Netherlands. And in Italy, from 2008 mink should have access to water to be able to swim in it. Sweden has submitted the European legislative council a proposal for a law to improve the welfare of farmed mink, who must be “kept in such a way as to satisfy their needs to move around, climb, hunt and carry out other activities, as well as spend time on their own”. By banning the importing into France in 2003 of all dog and cat skin products, France provided an impetus to Europe which banned their import into the whole European territory a few years later. This does not prevent China from continuing to massacre animals and remain the leading fur supplier to France. Much less strict rules and much cheaper labour make Chinese fur an attractive material. In the same way, if Europe has banned the importing and trade in products from baby seals since 1983 – and reinforced the text in 2004 – Canada has not reduced its hunting in any way and increases its quotas every year.
No welfare possible
Faced with consumers who are increasingly well-informed and are more and more demanding, the International Fur Trade Federation is trying to change the fur industry’s image. It has therefore set up its own "sustainable" fur rules by launching the Origin AssuredTM label in 2006. This guarantees buyers that the fur comes “from a country that has legislation to preserve animal welfare and has established standards”. What guarantee? That the animal has suffered slightly less than others ?
Because that is the question. When it comes to breeding, slaughter and trapping welfare is just not possible. The animal is turned into an instrument as an object of production. Whatever the laws, rules or standards say, fur is synonymous with suffering, barbarism and death. This is why One Voice is fighting to get the general public to refuse to buy fur (coats and accessories) which will enable us to see an end to this trade.
