How to Help | Resources | Spreading the Word | About the Seal Hunt | About Seals | News + Press | Politics + Propaganda | About Us

Seal Hunt 2010 - Political Actions for and Against the Slaughter

PM slams EU over seal ban go-ahead

Industry being targeted based on 'complete misinformation,' Harper says

Last Updated: Friday, August 20, 2010 | 5:06 PM CST
CBC News

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says an EU ban on seal products is completely unfair. (Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press)

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is slamming the European Union's decision to proceed with a ban on seal products despite a court ruling ordering that the policy be suspended while legal challenges to it are heard.

Speaking in Charlottetown on Friday, the prime minister urged the EU to respect its own court's injunction, saying the ban is "completely unfair and a discriminatory treatment" of a Canadian industry that employs people of modest means.

Seal industry workers, Harper said, are being "targeted by environmental extremists based on complete misinformation."

The Canadian government will continue to defend the sealers' interests because they respect the "same kind of humanitarian considerations" that are present in other areas of animal husbandry, Harper said.

"They should not be targetted like this, and the government of Canada will continue to speak out in their defence," said the prime minister.

Animal rights activists protest against Canada's seal hunt in front of the Canadian embassy in Madrid in April. (Andrea Comas/Reuters)

According to media reports, the EU ban went into effect on Friday, but seal products sold by groups that have already filed court actions appealing the ban are exempt from it. Those groups include the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, which represents Canada's 53,000 Inuit, and Greenland's Inuit.

The EU's General Court, based in Luxembourg, agreed on Thursday to impose a delay on the ban in order to properly consider the legal challenges, saying the delay was in the "interest of the proper administration of justice."

The EU ban already exempted trade in seal products that come from aboriginal groups, but Mary Simon, president of the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, said the Inuit fear their sales will still plummet when the ban comes into effect.

Last November, Canada made an official complaint to the World Trade Organization about the European ban, arguing it was a violation of the EU's trade obligations. Norway joined that complaint.

Canada exported about $5.5 million worth of seal products to the EU in 2006, when the price of pelts peaked at over $100, but the market has been cut in half in recent years, with about $2.5 million in seal products sent to the region in 2008.

While there are about 6,000 licensed seal hunters on the East Coast, only a few hundred took part in last season's hunt. About 67,000 seals were hunted — most of them harp seals off Newfoundland — even though the catch limit was about 350,000.

The Newfoundland government says the industry brought about $24 million into the provincial economy in 2008.

With files from The Canadian Press and The Associated Press

Canadian Seal Hunters Win Court-Ordered Reprieve From European Union Ban

By James G. Neuger - Aug 20, 2010 7:00 AM CT

Sixteen seal meat and pelt traders, most of them from Canada, won a temporary reprieve from a European Union import ban that took effect today after an EU court issued a last-minute injunction.

In a victory for the seal trappers and slaughterers that filed a legal challenge, the EU’s General Court exempted them from the ban at least until it hears arguments in the case next month.

Hailed as landmark legislation by animal rights activists when it was passed last year, the ban will “very temporarily” not cover the Canadian hunters, EU spokeswoman Amelia Torres told reporters in Brussels today.

Canada, Greenland and Namibia account for 60 percent of the 900,000 seals killed in commercial hunts annually, according to EU data. Norway and Russia are the next biggest seal-trapping countries.

Seals are “sentient beings that can experience pain, distress, fear and other forms of suffering,” reads the EU law, passed by 550 to 49 in the European Parliament in May 2009.

Calling seal harvesting a “way of life,” the Canadian fisheries ministry says a “healthy and abundant” population of 6.9 million harp seals in the north Atlantic Ocean isn’t threatened by commercial hunters.

In March, the ministry increased the 2010 quota for the harp seal harvest by 18 percent to 330,000. It left quotas unchanged at 50,000 for gray seals and 8,200 for hooded seals.

Inuit Eskimoes

The injunction from the Luxembourg-based EU court was disclosed yesterday by a group representing Canada’s Inuit Eskimoes, who opposed the ban even though their subsistence hunting was exempted.

The European animal-rights measure is “totally unjustified,” Mary Simon, head of Canada’s national Inuit organization, said in a statement on the group’s website.

The temporary reprieve covers only the people and organizations behind the court case, including the Canadian Seal Marketing Group, Torres said. She didn’t say how much of the seal trade they represent.

The court set a Sept. 7 deadline for the EU to respond to the injunction. The court will then decide whether to extend the reprieve for the duration of the case.

To contact the reporter on this story: James G. Neuger in Brussels at jneuger@bloomberg.net

Canada welcomes court suspension of EU seal ban

Thu Aug 19, 2010 6:31pm EDT

OTTAWA (Reuters) - A European court has ordered the suspension of a EU import ban on seal products that was set to begin on Friday, according to a copy of the ruling provided by a Canadian Inuit group.

The ruling made by the European Court of Justice on Thursday raises the stakes in a European Union trade dispute with Canada even as the two sides pursue wide-ranging free trade talks.

The court decision came in response to a request by the Canadian Inuit group for an injunction against the EU ban, which arose over concerns of brutality in the seal hunt.

"The operation of the conditions restricting the placing on the market of seal products ... is suspended," said the ruling, signed in Luxembourg.

It was not immediately clear how long the ban might be put on hold. Canada's Inuit leader Mary Simon said she hoped the decision would push the EU into scrapping its plans.

"I would hope that the European Parliament would see fit at this stage to do the right thing and withdraw its legislation," said Mary Simon, president of the group representing Canada's Inuit people.

Even though the ban exempts products from the traditional Inuit seal hunt, Inuit groups in Canada's vast Arctic region say the measure cuts prices and hurts their economy.

Canada's main seal hunt takes place in March and April on ice floes off the Atlantic Coast and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The seals are usually shot or bludgeoned over the head with a spiked club called a hakapik.

Seal products include fur for clothing and oil that is used in vitamin supplements.

The spat comes as Ottawa is pushing for closer economic ties with the EU, promising to finalize a free trade pact by next year that it says could rake in an extra 8 billion euros ($7.4 billion) for Canada within seven years. The next round of talks is in October.

In a related development, officials said on Thursday that Ottawa has asked the World Trade Organization to establish a dispute settlement panel in hopes of overturning the seal ban.

Canada argues that the EU action is misinformed and violates European WTO trade commitments. Ottawa says it is defending Atlantic communities that rely on the seal trade for survival.

The EU promised to defend its decision, which it said does not discriminate against Canada as it prohibits seal from other countries as well.

(Additional reporting by Juliane von Reppert-Bismarck in Geneva; editing by Janet Guttsman and Peter Galloway)

Pamela Anderson asks Russia's Putin to ban imports of Canadian baby seal fur

6/03/2010

Pamela Anderson asks Russia's Putin to ban imports of Canadian baby seal fur . Photo by Olga Gershenzon

Former Playboy bunny and Baywatch star Pamela Anderson once again pleaded to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to stop imports of seal pup fur from Canada, GZT.ru news portal reported on Thursday.

In her letter on June 2, Anderson, a spokesperson for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) organization, urged the former Russian president to ban imports of Canadian baby seal fur and leather, as Russia remains one of the few consuming countries of these products, while the United States, Mexico and the European Union banned this practice.

Pamela Anderson asks Russia's Putin to ban imports of Canadian baby seal fur . Photo by Olga Gershenzon

"My friends at PETA and I were pleased to see a recent slideshow spotlighting your fondness for animals. Since you've already banned the slaughter of baby seals in Russia, I'm writing to ask that you also ban seal-pelt imports from my native Canada, where almost all seals who are killed are 3 months of age or younger," Anderson wrote to Putin.

The 42-year-old Hollywood celebrity wrote a similar letter to the Russian premier in April last year, but it remained unanswered.

In February 2009, Putin called hunting baby harp seals "a bloody industry" and ordered the country's Natural Resources Ministry to ban hunting baby harp seals up to one year old.

Commercial seal hunting is conducted in Namibia, Greenland, Finland and Sweden, while Canada remains home to the world's largest annual commercial seal hunt.

MOSCOW, June 3 (RIA Novosti)

Cull seals to help cod: fishermen

Earle McCurdy, president of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union, says seals are threatening eastern Canadian cod stocks. (CBC)

Last Updated: Friday, June 4, 2010 | 7:43 AM NT

Fishermen say the seal population in eastern Canada should be culled to help fish stocks rebound.

The head of the Fish Food and Allied Workers union, that represents fishermen in Newfoundland and Labrador, says the Department of Fisheries and Oceans is ignoring the root cause of cod stock decline.

FFAW president Earle McCurdy said Thursday that the federal fisheries department should be controlling seals, not cutting cod quotas in the Northern Gulf of St. Lawrence.

DFO has cut this year's Northern Gulf cod quota by more than 40 per cent from 7,000 tonnes to 4,000 tonnes.

McCurdy said quota cuts punish harvesters without dealing with the real problem.

He says seals eat more fish than fishermen catch and the government should come up with a aggressive program to reduce grey seals.

McCurdy says DFO scientists have already linked grey seals to fish stock declines in the southern gulf.

Sealers group, Humane Society at odds over poll findings

A young harp seal rests on the ice off the coast of Cape Breton island, Nova Scotia, March 31, 2008. Photograph by: Paul Darrow/Reuters, np

By Bradley Bouzane, Canwest News ServiceApril 6, 2010

A recent poll reveals half of Newfoundland sealers surveyed support a federal buyout of the industry, which would involve fishermen and vessel owners being compensated for their sealing licences, and money being invested in economic alternatives for affected communities.

The poll, conducted by Ipsos Reid on behalf of the Humane Society International/Canada, an animal rights group that opposes the hunt, said half of the 181 sealers it polled by telephone between Dec. 7, 2009 and Jan. 24, 2010 were in favour of a buyout. The poll is considered accurate plus or minus 7.3 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

But the Canadian Sealers Association does not see that as a reasonable option and disputes the poll's accuracy.

"There's 11,000 licensed sealers in Newfoundland and Labrador and I don't know where they got the sealers," said Frank Pinhorn, executive director of the Canadian Sealers Association in Newfoundland. "I don't think their base for doing this survey is representative in any meaningful percentage."

The humane society said the poll indicates the sealers' desire to take an alternate route instead of receiving government subsidies to keep the industry viable.

"The Canadian government claims they are supporting sealers by promoting and subsidizing the sealing industry," Humane Society executive director Rebecca Aldworth said in a news release. "Yet this poll reveals broad support among sealers for a federal buyout of the sealing industry — a solution that would allow Canada to gracefully exit a controversy that has haunted us for five decades."

With the hunt set to open off Newfoundland's northeast coast on Thursday, one thing the two sides can seem to agree on is a depressed market for seal products.

Pinhorn said a reduced market is not only felt by the sealing industry, however, and expands into other fisheries as well.

"The sealing industry is not immune in 2009 or 2010 to what is happening worldwide with respect to the recession," Pinhorn said from Conception Bay South, just outside St. John's. "The market is cold on shrimp and lobsters and everything people in rural Newfoundland and Labrador harvest for a living."

Pinhorn estimates the total seal hunt this year will be similar to 2009, with only between 50,000 and 70,000 seals harvested. The quota set by the federal government is 335,000.

He insists the release of the poll is a ploy for groups opposed to the annual seal hunt to stay relevant when poor conditions do not allow them to be in the public eye during the harvest.

"Normally these groups make their pilgrimage to the Gulf (of St. Lawrence) each year and stick their helicopters down on the ice. But there's no ice out there this year, so they have to maintain their profile somehow," Pinhorn said. "It's an excuse to make people believe they're still doing something meaningful. It's another way for them to deceive the general public to get money into their accounts for selfish reasons. That's exactly what this is."

© Copyright Canwest News Service

Canadian Parliament to serve seal meat at lunch

By CHARMAINE NORONHA (AP) – March 8, 2010

TORONTO — The Canadian Parliament's restaurant will serve seal meat this week in support of hunters battling a European Union ban on seal products, a Liberal senator said Monday.

Celine Hervieux-Payette said Wednesday's seal meat lunch menu will allow politicians to demonstrate their backing for the annual hunt.

"All political parties will have the opportunity to demonstrate to the international community the solidarity of the Canadian Parliament behind those who earn a living from the seal hunt," she said in a statement.

The EU ban on seal imports was imposed last July on the grounds that Canada's annual hunt was inhumane.

The East Coast seal hunt, the largest in the world, kills an average of 275,000 harp seals during mid-November to mid-May. The seals are either shot or hit over the head with a spiked club called a hakapik.

Animal rights groups believe the hunt is cruel, poorly monitored and provides little economic benefit. Seal hunters and Canadian authorities say it is sustainable, humane and provides income for isolated communities.

The EU ban includes processed goods derived from seals, including their skins — which are used to make coats, bags and clothing — as well as meat, oil blubber, organs and seal oil, which is used in some omega-3 pills.

It exempts products derived from traditional hunts carried out by Inuit in Canada's Arctic, as well as those from Greenland, Alaska and Russia.

Canada has requested consultations with the EU at the World Trade Organization, which is the first step before launching an official trade challenge to salvage a Canadian industry valued at $10 million Canadian dollars ($9.7 million) in exports last year.

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Nunavut politician urges ban on European alcohol over seal-hunt protest

File photo of a herd of young Grey seals on Hay island off the coast of Nova Scotia (c) Reuters

By Laura Stone , Canwest News Service
March 6, 2010

A member of Nunavut’s government has proposed a ban on all liquor imported from Europe as a symbolic and retaliatory gesture against the continent for barring the sale of seal products from Canada.

South Baffin representative Fred Schell says he will propose a motion next week in the Nunavut legislature that seeks to stop the import of booze from the European Union into the territory’s three liquor stores. Schell said it’s a reaction to the EU decision last summer to essentially eliminate the trade of seal-product imports such as pelts, oil and meat, on the basis that the hunt is inhumane.

“I don’t think it’s right, what they did,” said Schell. “For a small population like we are, it affects a lot if you can’t sell your skins. That means a lot of dollars to a lot of people that have no other income other than hunting.”

Schell estimates thousands of people in his territory of 30,000 residents are affected by the ban, which has resulted in dropping pelt prices. According to the Fisheries Department, 5,000 to 6,000 people in Newfoundland and Labrador also derive some income from sealing, which is also practised in Quebec and elsewhere in Atlantic Canada.

It’s estimated the prohibition, which officially becomes law this spring, will result in a $2.4-million loss for the Canadian industry, which has taken a hit over the past couple of years. While pelts sold for $97 each in 2006, the price dropped to $33 in 2008.

The move to ban European alcohol — which is purchased by the Nunavut government — won’t result in a significant monetary loss for the EU’s 27 countries, but Schell said he hopes it will get the continent to reconsider the ban.

“It’s not a big dollar value, but it’s basically to get the point across, and I’m hoping that Newfoundland and the rest of Canada pays attention to this, and maybe they’ll do something to get (the EU) to change their mind on the ban,” he said, adding that the seal hunt is not wasteful and that all parts of the animal are used.

Canada has already filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization over the decision to ban trade in seal products, saying the Canadian hunt meets internationally accepted humanitarian, scientific and environmental standards. Members of Canada’s Inuit community are pursuing legal action against the EU for banning importation.

In the meantime, Canada has launched an aggressive campaign to sell seal meats and products in China in hopes that it will be enough to save the industry.

© Copyright Canwest News Service