For a person like me – an animal advocate and somebody who simply detests the fur trade and the traders – these protesters are heroes. You have to be pretty brave to walk into a fur sale in what appears to be a hotel and start blowing a whistle while carrying banners which say that the fur trade is cruel. You are going to have to be prepared to meet with aggressive people because the kind of people who trade furs are the kind who have personalities which might make them aggressive in my view. On the contrary, the protesters are more likely to be passive because they are more sensitive to animal sentience. Perhaps a simplistic formula but it is borne out by what we see in the video.
It is depressing to report that every year over 90 million animals are killed for their fur; that is, the skin on their back. This includes 44.4 million mink and 7.8 million foxes alone. The US imported, in 2021 $64.2 million-worth of fur apparel which was a decrease from 2019 and 2013.
95% of fur comes from animals confined in cages on factory farms. You can imagine the level of cruelty which ends in the death of the animal.
Also depressingly, I’m told that artificial fur exports decreased by 25.8% between 2019 in 2020. As I understand it, one reason is that artificial fur is more expensive than real fur. This indicates to us the incredibly low value of animals who give up their lives to supply the fur trade.
China, unsurprisingly, is the world’s largest fur re-exporter. The country is a major player in the fur trade and a major source of fur for the worldwide market. I say unsurprising because the relationship between Chinese citizens in China and animals is not a good one. The general underlying attitude of the vast majority of Chinese citizens is that animals are there to benefit humans; to be utilitarian and functional which includes eating them and taking the skin off their backs. The dog and cat fur markets in China are obscenely cruel to animals.
In Norway fur farming will be phased out completely by 2025. Clearly, Norway has finally decided that the fur trader is cruel and out of step with modern thinking about animal welfare.
It appears, despite these unsettling statistics that the fur trade business is declining as it should do because of its inherent cruelty which is supported by the price of mink pelts dropping by 28% from 2017 to 2018.
Sadly, Europe has its black sheep country with respect to the fur trade which is Italy as in 2017 it was the largest global market for fur products with a value of $1.6 billion. It is a major player in the fur market. But see image link below for an update.
Despite the world having moved on and progressed in terms of animal welfare, the fur industry is an important part of the global economy worth billions of dollars. The traders are reluctant to give up their profitable businesses when turning a blind eye to the obvious: gross animal cruelty.
