Anti-Sealing Protest in Halifax, NS

In a few short weeks, Canada’s commercial seal hunt will begin off the east coast of Canada. Last year, more than 217,000 harp seals were killed, 99.8% of which were under 3 months of age.

Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) claims that the commercial seal hunt is "closely monitored and tightly regulated" and is conducted in strict adherence to the Marine Mammal Regulations. In direct contradiction of these claims, extreme cruelty has been witnessed and captured on film by observers in past years, and documentation of these violations of the Marine Mammal Regulations have been captured on video and have gone uninvestigated and unprosecuted by DFO.

Violations include sealers leaving injured seals to die slowly on the ice or allowing them to escape to the water where they perish slowly, hooking and dragging animals still consciously struggling and in obvious pain, and skinning animals alive.

Members of the European parliament (MEPs) from the IMCO (Internal Market and Consumer Protection) Committee, voted on March 2 overwhelmingly in favor of a ban on the trade in seal products without any derogation, and with a single exemption for products from traditional Inuit seal hunts.

The Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans has finally admitted what IFAW has been saying for years: that the current Marine Mammal Regulations are not in line with the recommendations of veterinarians, and do not meet the  requirements for humane killing as presented in the proposed European ban on  seal products.
 
In response,  they are cynically proposing "tweaks" to the Regulations, that they claim will make the seal hunt more humane and allow Canada to circumvent any EU trade ban. But the proposed changes will do nothing to improve  animal welfare, and shouldn't fool any European policy-maker.

When today's Russia, hardly a model of heightened sensitivities, decides its seal hunt is too barbaric to continue, the end is near for Canada's sealers.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the ban on killing very young seals would be extended to all of the animals. It's a "bloody industry," he said, and the hunt should have been banned long ago. 

Canada's government still defends the hunt on the ice off the Atlantic coast. There are lots of seals, hunters in a poor part of the country need the money and it's not much more cruel than a typical slaughterhouse, the government says.

There's great debate about the economic impact, but it's likely somewhere in the $7 million range.

Clubbing animals to death on the ice might be humane, but it doesn't look it. The 2008 regulations were amended to require sealers to slit the arteries under the seals' flippers after clubbing them; that was to avoid any risk they would be skinned alive, but it highlights the grisly nature of the hunt.

It's galling for hunters from Newfoundland and the Magdalen Islands to be lectured by pop stars and politicians who have never witnessed the hunt about something they have done all their lives. And they have been the victim of misleading campaigns against the seal hunt.

...There comes a time when a traditional practice becomes too great a liability to continue. For the Canadian seal hunt, that time is now. The hunt, by most standards, is cruel. The potential damage to Canada's image and economy is significant.

 

Help the sealers, by all means. But don't let Russia set a higher standard for humane treatment of animals.

As part of its marine mammal regulatory review process last year, for example, DFO reportedly created a working group to provide advice on improving animal welfare in the seal hunt. This group included both the fur institute's director, Dr. Daoust, a pathologist, and the pelt processor executive, Mr. Dakins.

....DFO is taking animal welfare advice from a representative of a seal processing company...

The Fur Institute of Canada (FIC) - which receives federal government funding from DFO - was responsible for bailing out the slaughter by lining up NuTan furs as the buyer. It is surely no coincidence that Dion Dakins, sales director of NuTan furs, is also a Vice-Chairman on the Board of Directors of the Fur Institute of Canada.

‘The Harper Seals’ performing in Canada March 06, 2009

A new band has formed… their aim is to raise awareness of Canada’s commercial seal hunt through their music! Their favourite tunes include ‘Do you really want to hurt me’ and ‘Don’t be Cruel’. The band wants to raise the profile of the issue and encourage their fans to write to Stephen Harpers government about the commercial seal hunt.

The band will be performing in Toronto at Yonge and Dundas Square on Saturday 14th March at 2pm and in Ottawa on Sunday 15th March at 1pm (William Street, in the Byward Market).

An effort by a Liberal senator to effectively ban the East Coast seal hunt was dealt a fatal blow Tuesday when not a single colleague could be found to second his motion.

Senator Mac Harb, a former MP from Ottawa named to the upper chamber in 2003, tried to put forward a bill to cancel the traditional hunt for everyone except aboriginal hunters with treaty rights.

But his effort was met with silence.

Honourable Senator Mac Harb (Liberal) successfully introduced Bill S-229
referred as the "Harb Seal Bill", to end all commerical seal hunts in Canada.

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