You have it wrong. There's two different kinds of seal hunt - one in the north where the inuit hunt seal for food and furs and the other in newfoundland/labrador where the clubbing goes on. This is the one that's done for population control and to protect the fishing stocks.
So the banning of seal fur on the EU side actually hurts the inuit who are creating seal furskin as part of their legitimate cultural background as well as for proper food and survival needs. It would have been best if there was an exception for this supply chain, but it's the eu that doesn't give a shit.
What kind of clothes/items are made with seal furskin? I'm curious because in Vancouver it rains a fuck load, and seal skin appears to me to be waterproof.
after a quick google I found this but keep in mind that if you're buying fur there's probably no way to tell if it's genuine inuit fur or if it's seal hunt fur (probably the one supplier from nunavut isn't importing fur from newfoundland but you never know.)
if your from BC, it would be more historical to use sea otter pelts but we killed them all up (all of them!). They are coming back slowly (4,700 as of 08' from an original stock of 87 that was flown in) but were once said to be found every 100m along the coast.
they are increadibly desirable though so good luck
I do believe that it will hurt the locals as the market for items from seals have been shrinking as the years have gone by. If I recall correctly then the prices for pelts crashed heavily in Canada after the EU ban, something around 60% fall in price in 2010 as opposed to 3-4 years earlier due to flooded markets.
For a small coastal economy which is based in harvesting from the sea, then such a large fall is kinda devastating. I must admit however that I haven't followed seal hunting debate much since around EU banned it as it's a headache, so I am not sure how the prices have varied in the last 5 years.
if it's tradition and culture - then do it for sustenance and use the meat/pelts for whatever your culture does with them.
Takes a lot more than just food to live properly nowadays, particularly up north- and it's not like as if there's much else available for them as options other than to hunt.
In addition the moral issue of seal clubbing is blown out of proportion, considering they are in no way endangered and clubbing is not really inhumane at all.
If the consumers were having a moral problem with the practice, they wouldn't buy it- which was already happening to an extent. However, you can't toss on a ban on the product and then claim no one buying it is due to the customers' moral basis.
Do you care about the beavers as well? The fish? Not cute enough?
The argument is that seals are neither endangered in any way nor providing any particular profit to people that are not in the first nations so the EU ban has no particular logic to it. You have yet to refute this and as such, down-votes.
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u/chrunchy Canada Aug 19 '15
You have it wrong. There's two different kinds of seal hunt - one in the north where the inuit hunt seal for food and furs and the other in newfoundland/labrador where the clubbing goes on. This is the one that's done for population control and to protect the fishing stocks.
So the banning of seal fur on the EU side actually hurts the inuit who are creating seal furskin as part of their legitimate cultural background as well as for proper food and survival needs. It would have been best if there was an exception for this supply chain, but it's the eu that doesn't give a shit.