Survey: 62 % of Finns do not approve of killing animals for their fur
21 January 2021
Animalia
Survey: 62 % of Finns do not approve of killing animals for their fur | Eurogroup for Animals
Photo – Jo Anne McArthur
According to a survey by the polling company Taloustutkimus, 62 % of Finns do not approve of killing animals for their fur.
The figure has increased by two percentage points from 2019. The figures show a growing opposition to, and disapproval of, the fur industry in Finland.
Opposition to fur farming has emerged also in other surveys published this Autumn. According to surveys commissioned by NGOs Animalia and Oikeutta eläimille, 76 % of Finns do not accept subsidies to fur farming. 73 % want to either ban farming altogether or think that the law should require considerably more space for the animals and offer better opportunities for the animals’ species-specific behavioural needs.
There has also been a tightening of attitudes towards fur farming in the Finnish Parliament. In August, the Social Democratic Party, which is the party of the Prime Minister, adopted an anti-fur position. The National Coalition Party, currently in the opposition, now calls on the decree on the protection of fur animals to be revised to meet “standards of a civilized state”.
The year 2020 has been catastrophic for fur farming in Europe, with Poland and France deciding on fur farming bans. The Netherlands decided to put an end to mink farming due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Denmark banned mink farming temporarily for the same reason. The Sars-CoV-2 virus has been found on fur farms in many other countries as well, and pressure is increasing for a Europe-wide ban on mink farming.
In Finland, the fur industry has received more than five million euros in subsidies during 2020 and no new restrictions on fur farming are in sight. In 2021, a new animal welfare law as well as a new decree on the protection of fur animals are to be decided on. It is possible to set new restrictions on fur farming through these legislative processes. Fur farming could be prohibited in the animal welfare law, and new restrictions on fur farming could be set in the decree on the protection of fur animals.
Animalia advocates for a ban on fur farming after a phase-out period.
“We are living in difficult times, suffering confinements, unable to enjoy our families. Many people feel overwhelmed, despair, anxious, stress … All this, has made you think about how the animals used in the fur industry feel?
All these animals feel the same as you, and they suffer from birth to death.
They live locked up in these cages exposed to inclement weather, hunger, thirst, and loneliness, all their lives, all the time.
Don’t get dressed with their lives”!
Text: Animal Equality
And I would say… that we haven’t learned anything from the Corona catastrophe.
Because we don’t have the same level of suffering as the other animals.
Despite restrictions, we still live on the sunny side of capitalism and decide – as before -about the cruel life and death of millions of other animals. We are habitual criminals.
Mink farms not only cause immense animal suffering, these coronavirus reservoirs put human lives at risk, say animal welfare groups
By FOUR PAWS, Eurogroup for Animals and Fur Free Alliance
A year ago, no one would have imagined that the coronavirus pandemic would hit the world, affecting more than 91 million people, and killing more than 1.9 million. People are looking forward to a better 2021 for their countries, their families and themselves. However, worries about the long-term impact of COVID-19 persist.
In 2021, urgent action must be taken to halt the spread and to eliminate potential sources of the SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Farms where mink (Neovison vison) are bred for fur production, beside causing immense suffering to animals, are coronavirus reservoirs.
Risk to humans and animals
Farmed mink are highly susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection. They catch it from humans, pass it on to each other and spread it back to humans.
“The poor living conditions on fur farms, which keep animals In unnatural close proximity facilitate the spread of the disease.”
The first cases were identified in the Netherlands in April 2020. Since then, more than 390 mink farms have been infected by the virus in Denmark, Sweden, Greece, Spain, Italy, France and, most recently, new infections have been identified in Poland and Lithuania. More mink farms are affected in the U.S. and Canada.
The poor living conditions on fur farms, which keep animals in unnatural close proximity, facilitate the spread of the disease.
“Clearly, this issue causes significant danger for humans and terrible suffering for animals. On fur farms, mink are crammed into tiny cages. Specifically, 0.255 square meters are available for each animal,” said Thomas Pietsch, fur expert at FOUR PAWS. “Stressed or weakened animals, crammed closely together with thousands of conspecifics, provide the ideal breeding ground for infectious diseases.”
Affected countries have taken drastic measures. The Netherlands moved up its ban on fur farming to 2021 from 2024 and has culled all its mink. Ireland decided to cull its farmed mink population pre-emptively, likely ending the industry in the country. Hungary also announced a ban on mink and other species farming as a precautionary measure.
The issue has turned the corner after Danish public health authorities found new virus variants of COVID-19 originating from mink in a number of infected humans. This new variant could make vaccines less effective, as it may potentially reduce the effect of antibodies. Consequently, the Danish government decided to cull up to 17 million farmed mink and suspended mink farming until 2022.
The example of Denmark is a warning: spillover of SARS-CoV-2 from humans to mink, and mink to humans is not a new finding and could have severe public health implications.
It has had a considerable resonance in Brussels. A few days after the mutation was detected, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) highlighted the fact that new strands of coronavirus could potentially undermine the international efforts to combat the virus. An EU Rapid Risk Assessment has been conducted by the ECDC, the European Medicines Agency and the European Food Safety Authority. Moreover, EU agriculture ministers agreed that this is a European health issue, which needs a harmonized response. During the Agri Council meeting in November, the German Minister of Agriculture and former president of the Council, Julia Klöckner, questioned whether mink keeping still has a future at all.
“Allowing the continuation of mink farming by putting niche economic interests over public health should not be an option.”
“The Commission is expected to draft a working paper on the issue of COVID-19 and mink production,” said Pierre Sultana, director of the FOUR PAWS European Policy Office. “We hope the Commission will adopt a precautionary approach and recognize that the issue can have severe consequences on human health. Allowing the continuation of mink farming by putting niche economic interests over public health should not be an option .”
The Commission issued an implementing decision on December 21 2020 on protective measures in relation to reporting SARS-CoV-2 infection in mink and other Mustelidae and raccoon dogs. The Commission asks member states to monitor and report susceptible animals for SARS-CoV-2 infection, including mink and raccoon dogs, and acknowledges the need to take urgent, harmonized action on this issue. However, it falls short of addressing effectively the serious public health risks linked to mink farming.
Urgent and proportionate action is needed
In an open letter to the Commission published on December 15 2020, 47 Eurogroup for Animals and Fur Free Alliance member organizations from all EU member countries called for an end to fur farming. We cannot afford the risk that the production of fur impedes efforts to eradicate this disease by preserving a reservoir for SARS-CoV-2 or undermining the efficacy of future vaccines.
To tackle the issue effectively, the EU must adopt emergency and proportionate measures by suspending all mink farming, including breeding — and all in-country and cross-border transportation of live mink and their raw pelts, both inside and outside the European Union. As part of such a measure, the EU should play a key role in making ‘One Health’ a reality — a concept that acknowledges how tightly interknit human, animal and environmental health are — and further promote the comprehensive “One Welfare” approach.
“It is more urgent than ever, in times where new mutations of this deadly virus are starting to emerge in animals and humans.”
Joh Vinding, chair of the Fur Free Alliance
First, the EU must prevent the establishment of SARS-CoV-2 reservoirs. From a public health perspective, the continued presence of mink farms in Europe would serve to maintain coronavirus reservoir within human communities. Despite enhanced biosecurity, early warning surveillance and immediate culling of animals in infected farms, experience in Denmark and the Netherlands has shown that it has been impossible to stop the transmission of the virus.
Second, the EU must avert the spread of an emerging virus in a new host which may lead to an accumulation of mutations and resistance to developed vaccines. Given the devastating impacts caused by the global coronavirus pandemic, we cannot afford to take this risk.
The upcoming meeting of the EU Agricultural Ministers on January 25 will offer the perfect opportunity to discuss COVID-19 and mink farming.
“We ask the Ministers of Agriculture of all EU Member States to call on the Commission to take effective action to suspend the breeding of mink in fur farming across the EU,” said Reineke Hameleers, CEO of Eurogroup for Animals.
“It is more urgent than ever, in times where new mutations of this deadly virus are starting to emerge in animals and humans,” said Joh Vinding, chair of the Fur Free Alliance.
Fur farms cause massive animal suffering and now we know that they also pose an enormous health risk for humans. A large majority of EU citizens reject fur farms and support a ban of this outdated industry which is already illegal in a growing number of member countries.
According to the United Nations, the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 outbreak will cost at least $8.5 trillion to the world economy over the next two years and the EU needs to provide financial assistance of up to €100 billion to avoid a major economic crisis. There is hope in 2021 thanks to vaccination programs, but the battle is not over. COVID-19 in mink farms is a pressing issue: there is no better time to end fur farming.
BREAKING NEWS regarding the mink farming issue in Denmark. Now, it appears that it will be in Sweden instead. Because mink farming is banned in Denmark for 2021, Danish mink farmers now want to start up their buisness again. Not in Denmark, but in neighbouring country Sweden instead where it’s still legal despite pandemic!
Sweden could very well become the new Denmark, with tens of millions of mink farmed and killed every year. As it is now, there are about 40 fur farms in Sweden. The introduction of Danish fur farmers in Sweden is “warmly welcomed” by the Swedish mink industry for “job opportunities” in Southern Sweden. Out of the 8 parties in the Parliament of Sweden, 6 supports fur farming and would welcome this addition to the Swedish fur industry.
“The mink industry is wiped out and banned in Denmark after the corona mutation that led to a mass death of 15 million minks.
Several of the country’s mink breeders are now looking to Sweden to start again.
– We are obviously very positive about it, says Jörgen Martinsson, CEO of Swedish mink.
The news about the Danish minks has received international attention during the autumn.
It was when a mutated variant of the corona virus was discovered on several mink farms in the country that a professor went out and warned that Denmark could become “a new Wuhan”. The government acted forcefully and demanded that all minks in the country – about 15 million – be killed.
In November, the next blow came to the mink industry. The Danish government then banned all mink industry from being conducted throughout 2021.
– Danish mink industry as we know it is gone. It is a grief without its equal and a shocking decision for the mink industry in Denmark but also in the rest of Europe, says Jörgen Martinsson, CEO of the industry organization Swedish mink.
Most farms in southern Sweden Recently, about ten Danish mink breeders have contacted Swedish mink to review the possibility of establishing their operations in Sweden instead, says Jörgen Martinsson.
– We are of course very positive that Danish breeders are interested. Partly because we have had a lot of collaborations and exchanges with Danish breeders for a long time, partly because they have long experience and great competence in this.
The discussions have been both about taking over existing farms in Sweden but also starting their own farms on Swedish soil.
– It is mostly in southern Sweden, this is where the best opportunities are, says Martinsson.
Last fall 15 September The mutation that was discovered on mink farms seems to be extinct – the last confirmed case was on 15 September.
Since the first outbreak, about 15 million minks have been killed. Anyone who has not yet killed their mink must do so by 15 January, but the mink breeders are still waiting for the promised financial compensation from the government.
– It is still chaos in different ways. A political chaos which, of course, entailed great uncertainty. How is the Danish mink industry feeling today? It is not possible to answer because it does not really exist anymore, says Jörgen Martinsson.”
BANS, NEAR-BANS AND CLOSURES… but tens of millions of animals are still dying
Dear Friend and Supporters,
Our campaign against the cruel fur trade is advancing. Many parts of the fur industry are in serious trouble and even retreat, as a result, far fewer animals are likely to suffer next year.
But we must not be fooled into thinking these tragic events herald permanent change. In fact, the long term for animals could be even worse – unless we act forcefully right now.
Whilst mink farmers and the auction house have been devastated in Denmark as a result of the COVID virus, the fur trade is already lobbying very hard to secure a revival of the industry and, ominously, Chinese fur breeders and dealers are planning to fill the void created by the European declines.
2020 has been an extraordinary and tragic year. It did, however, mark both the 20th anniversary of the UK ban on fur farming and the 10th anniversary of the EU ban on the import of commercial seal products, the latter saving the lives of some 2 million baby seals whilst the UK ban set the precedent for fur farming bans all over Europe. Incredible reminders of what can be achieved by us working together.
With so much news to take in and digest we at Respect for Animals are working flat out, despite the current crisis, to end this cruel and abysmal industry and to adapt our campaigns to the changing circumstances.
BUT WE NEED YOUR HELP – URGENTLY.
Please can you help out by making a donation to our Special Christmas Appeal to help us make 2021 a special year for the anti-fur campaign and, therefore, for the animals that are depending on us.
Thank you to all of you in the UK who have contacted your Member of Parliament urging support for Early Day Motion 267 for our Fur Free UK campaign. The Motion now has the second highest number of signatures for this session of Parliament and it would be great to see it at Number 1! If you have not already contacted your MP, please do so as soon as possible, asking her or him to sign.
Millions of fox, mink, raccoon dogs, and chinchillas spend their entire lives trapped in tiny wire cages before being killed and skinned for so-called fashion.
Not only do these battery cage systems cause immense animal suffering, but they are also now proven to present a serious public health risk.
The cramped conditions, poor hygiene, stress, injuries and disease, minimal veterinary care, and lack of genetic diversity all mean that fur farms create ideal conditions for viruses to be transmitted.
(To see the video click on the picture)
Twenty countries have already acted to ban the farming of animals.
In light of new evidence that fur farms can also act as reservoirs for deadly viruses, as well as create new viruses, we call on all countries to ban fur farms.
End cruel and deadly fur farming worldwide!
Sign now to end the cruel and deadly fur trade before it causes the next pandemic!
This petition is part of a global campaign initiated by “Fur Free Alliance”.
And I mean…Every year more than 700,000,000 animals are slaughtered for their meat. In Germany.
There are 60,000,000,000 animals worldwide.
In addition, there are 100,000,000 to 300,000,000 living things that are used and killed as experimental animals every year.
And for fluffy fur collars, over 60,000,000 mink and 12,000,000 foxes give up their miserable lives every year, as do around 2,000,000 dogs and cats.
Wasn’t it a matter of time before it took its revenge?
Because we humans don’t care about animals anyway (otherwise we wouldn’t lock them up in wire cages for an expendable fashion accessory and slaughter them), we come straight to the explosive part of the story: the mink variant of the virus is apparently against Covid-19 antibodies more resistant in the human body, which means that it could spread among people who are already immune or vaccinated.
In other words, and in this case: the previous efforts to produce a vaccine would have been in vain.
The WHO warns of excessive concern, but the Danish government recognized the risk immediately and has shut down the industry completely and in these days had all 17 million minks in Denmark culled immediately.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have been looking down on the Chinese and their virus-contaminated “wet markets”, where domestic and exotic animals are traded live and slaughtered on site – “Something uncivilized!” we say- and wonder why the Chinese government did not regulate these hygienic death zones a long time ago.
In the meantime, we continue to shred or gas male chicks (40 million in Germany alone), buy cheap pork, even though we know what happens to the piglets and how their mothers are suffering, and we ignore the mass murder of pigs because of swine flu.
Even if the particularly gruesome pictures come from the fur farms in China, the photos from the fur farms here, in Europe, are also a horror.
Practically, all farms look the same, no matter which country they are in. All show the same bleak, cruel picture that allows only one conclusion: fur is suffering, pain, and contradicts any moral progress in our society, and therefore it has to be prohibited!
In the future no lockdowns will help, only a new morality based on the liberation of animals from their slavery
Denmark is set to dig up millions of mink that were culled because of a mutated form of coronavirus.
About four million mink will be exhumed from mass graves and incinerated to prevent pollution, the government said.
It is set to happen in May, when officials say the risk of coronavirus contamination from the dead animals will have passed.
More than 15 million mink have been culled in Denmark, devastating its fur industry – the largest in the EU.
Some of the mink buried in mass graves in a military area in the west of the country have resurfaced because of the nitrogen and phosphorus gases produced by their decay.
The two burial sites are highly controversial, as one is near a bathing lake and the other not far from a source of drinking water. Residents have complained about the potential risk of contamination.
The ministry of food and agriculture said in a statement on Sunday that the government had gained support in parliament to dig up the mink next year.
“Once the mink are no longer contaminated with Covid-19, they will be transported to an incineration facility, where they’ll be burned as commercial waste,” the ministry said.
Denmark announced early last month that it would cull all of its mink after a mutated form of coronavirus was found on mink farms. There were concerns that the mutated variant could threaten the effectiveness of future vaccines.
In addition to world-famous fur giants such as Denmark and Poland, Greece also operates around 90 active mink farms.
Given the significant health risks associated with COVID-19 outbreaks on mink farms, fur farming is receiving a lot of attention right now.
On November 16, 2020, the Greek Ministry for Rural Development and Food announced that minks had tested positive for the coronavirus on a fur farm in the Kozani area- in the north of the country.
Minks in Kastoria-Greece
As in November 2020 in Denmark, as a precautionary measure, all 2,500 minks were tortured and their bodies burned on the Greek farm.
The Greek fur industry has been in decline for years
The fur industry in Greece is clearly feeling the decline in global demand for fur products.
2018 data from the Greek statistical agency shows a visible decline in Greek fur exports. Nevertheless, thousands of mink are still locked in tiny lattice cages and gassed at the young age of six months.
The fur is not a cultural heritage
To prevent the downfall of the cruel industry, the Association of the Greek Fur Industrysubmitted an application for recognition of fur production in the national inventory of intangible cultural heritage in 2016. The aim of such an inclusion in the state inventory is the possibility of being able to describe the peeled animal skins as a kind of art form.
Mink-Kastoria
The request was rejected and the relevant directorate emphasized that an activity based on the killing of animals for the sole purpose of acquiring their skins is not compatible with the basic principles of sustainable development.
Greek fur industry kept alive by EU subsidies
Despite the decline in export figures and the decision by well-known fashion designers such as Donatella Versace and Jean Paul Gaultier to stop using fur, the Greek government increased the number of nationwide fur farms from 43 in 2011 to 131 in 2018.
In addition, state aid for the fur industry from national and above all EU subsidies was further increased.
It is time for the Greek Parliament to ban this dying industry, with all the pain and suffering it causes, once and for all.
You too can help save hundreds of thousands of animals from a cruel death.
Animals still suffer on over 90 fur farms in Greece. Write to Prime MinisterKyriakos Mitsotakis now and demand an end to all Greek fur farming!
Take action and ban fur farming in Greece!
Online Petition (text) “I was shocked to read that animals in Greece are still being violently murdered for their fur and that Greek fur farms now not only cause animals to suffer horribly but also have become a threat to human health.
According to media reports, minks on Greek fur farms have been infected with COVID-19. This causes additional suffering and stress for these animals – unlike infected humans, ill minks do not receive medical care, nor are they provided with safe and stress-free housing in which to recover. On the nearly 90 fur farms in the country, the animals live stuffed next to each other inside cramped cages. Living in such confined spaces is extremely stressful for wild animals and leads to physical and mental disorders, including self-mutilation and insanity. Furthermore, because of this cruel confinement, urine, excrement, pus, and blood from sick or injured animals easily contaminate the restricted living areas of all the others.
On Danish fur farms, the novel coronavirus has mutated, and a new strain has spread among minks and workers, who infect other humans.
The Dutch parliament voted by an overwhelming majority to bring forward the fur farming ban in the Netherlands because of the spread of COVID-19 and will close all fur farms by the end of 2020. Similar bans are already in place in Austria, the Czech Republic, Israel, the UK, and several other countries. Now is clearly the time to end the suffering of animals used for their fur, and closing down the fur industry would help prevent both the spread of the current pandemic and similar future outbreaks.
For the sake of animal welfare and human safety, please shut down fur farms in Greece and outlaw fur farming there immediately.
And I mean…” Closed due to the pandemic”. The sign on the door of the fur shops in Greece in three languages – Greek, Russian and English – posted a few weeks ago, for the second time this year, is probably unnecessary, as there are no potential buyers due to lockdown.
Why should it be any different in Greek fur farms than in Denmark or the Netherlands?
Corona has also attacked 2,500 animals there and, as in other countries, genocide will be the “solution”, and the Greek fur farm owners have already wiped out 2,500 creatures!
Another 5,000 animals in one of the four farms are likely to be killed, as several of the mink have already died there,
More than 1 million fur animals live and suffer on Greek farms.
The annual turnover was 250 million euros until 2019, this year it has dropped to 5 million. Many companies in northern Greece that used to benefit from fur animals are now closed.
But not only due to Corona.
The fur industry is taking its last breath, internationally.
Fur has no future, nor does fur production in Greece
More than 90% of fur-exports from Greece go to Russia.
But since 2014 -15 this is no longer the case.
Because on the one hand, Russia is strengthening the internal production of fur, which however is not enough.
On the other hand, China is now Russia`s main supplier of fur.
But the Greek government does not want to see the truth. While the collapse of the fur-sector, a sector that is coming to an end at a very fast pace, is a global reality including Greece, the Minister of Agriculture Development announces support of 3 million for the fur breeders sector.
Those who are involved in the fur-breeding industry often cite a number of “arguments” to justify the abuse of live and sentient animals.
“breeding furs is exactly the same as raising chickens, sheep, or cows.”
Correct!
But that’s the same absurd logic if we were to acquit a murderer because so many other people commit crimes too.
On 12/11/20, we at WAV wrote to the Danish Ambassador in London expressing our concerns over the mass murder of the fur farm Mink. You can read more about it here:
Well as of today, 18/12/20 – over 5 weeks since we wrote; we still have heard nothing back or had any response whatsoever from the embassy in London.
A lot has happened since the early days in Denmark; and the latest is that we hear the murdered mink; which were buried in mass graves due to their numbers; have possibly contaminated the groundwater in Denmark. Read more about it below. A kind of ‘Fur Farm Karma’ from all the culled animals; we have no sympathy for the Danes – they wanted to do mass fur farming and the abuses that go with it; now they have this problem as a result !
Mink buried in mass graves may have contaminated groundwater in Denmark
18 December 2020
Millions of mink massacred and buried in mass graves in Denmark due to coronavirus fears may have contaminated the groundwater — as parliament announced it would probe the ordeal.
Officials determined last month that all of the country’s more than 15 million mink would need to be slaughtered, after a mutated version of COVID-19 — with the potential to weaken the effectiveness of vaccines — was discovered in fur farms and factories.
Authorities, who could not handle incinerating so many dead animals at once, instead buried many of them just three feet deep in a military training field in West Jutland, The Guardian reported.
Some have even risen from their graves like zombies, propelled by gases released during the decomposition process.
As a result of the mass burials, groundwater in the area may have already been polluted by the carcasses of the furry critters, local station Radio4 reported, citing a study for the environmental protection agency.
Shocking footage from mink gassing, minks dying in agony on a Polish farm
18 December 2020
Otwarte Klatki
Slow death in a gassing box, beating the animals to death with a metal rod, crushing the still breathing minks by the dead ones – shocking footage from a mink farm in Długie Stare near Leszno, the Greater Poland Voivodeship, was published by Otwarte Klatki. The activists informed the prosecutor’s office about the incident.
The investigation was conducted at the turn of November and December 2020 by the activists from Open Cages Poland (Otwarte Klatki) and the German organization SOKO Tierschutz. Hidden cameras were installed at the mink farm in the village of Długie Stare. For several days, they recorded the slaughter of mink – both inside and outside the gassing box. These are the first recordings of this type from Polish fur farms.
The videos show three people who carry out slaughtering with a gas box. They throw the minks into the gassing box carelessly, and the animals who survived the gassing are hit with a metal rod or killed by hitting against a wooden joist. It is also visible that one mink is killed by kicking. In the cart, into which dead animals are thrown, you can clearly see the minks, which are still breathing, and their bodies are crushed by the bodies of their companions.
Minks in Kastoria-Greece
Mink-Kastoria
World Animals Voice 