Opinion: A call to end fur farms and stop cruelty to foxes, minks and other animals

Last month, liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith introduced Bill C-247 in the House of Commons, which aims to ban fur farming nationwide.

Every year in Canada, more than three million animals are killed for their fur, the vast majority of whom are minks and foxes raised in captivity specifically for this purpose.

While the numbers are quite impressive, the fur industry has been undergoing a steady decline for some time, and Quebec is no exception.

In 1982, there were 226 fur farms in our province, but only a total of nine remained in 2018.

This decline can be observed on a global scale as social acceptability of fur production has reached an all-time low.

According to a recent poll, close to 75 per cent of Canadians oppose farming animals for their fur.

A growing number of brands such as Versace, Michael Kors, Gucci, and, most recently, Dolce & Gabbana, have abandoned the use of fur in their collections. Designers cite animal welfare concerns as the motivating factor behind their decision, mainly as a result of pressure from animal protection groups.

A fox in a cage that is raised for its fur. (photo: Jo-Anne McArthur / #MakeFurHistory / We Animals Media)

On the legislative front, more than a dozen countries have banned fur farming over the last decade, most recently France and Italy. In 2021, British Columbia became the first Canadian province to prohibit mink farms following a series of COVID-19 outbreaks in these facilities.

Indeed, fur farming poses a serious threat to public health due to the very real risk of pathogen emergence and transmission in intensive farming contexts involving wildlife. It is also a very resource-intensive industry with far-reaching environmental impacts, including water and soil pollution caused by manure runoff.

In Canada foxes and minks are bred for their fur (photo: Jo-Anne McArthur / #MakeFurHistory / We Animals Media)

Animal protection organizations have been relentlessly advocating against fur not only because it is a non-essential luxury item, but also because this industry is particularly brutal towards animals.

Foxes, who roam home ranges of approximately a dozen square kilometres in the wild, are confined to tiny wire cages on fur farms. Minks are kept by the tens of thousands in crowded cages piled one on top another inside sheds, with no access to bathing areas, even though they are solitary, semi-aquatic animals.

Such living conditions prevent these animals from expressing their most basic, natural behaviours, resulting in severe frustration and stress that are well documented in scientific studies.

The killing methods used are the most barbaric imaginable: minks are put to death by asphyxiation, while foxes are killed using anal electrocution.

These aren’t obsolete methods still being used in a handful of “old school” facilities; they are standard industry practice, and are even codified in the guidelines developed by the National Farm Animal Care Council.

Minks are crammed in cages with no access to water for bathing even though they are semi-aquatic animals (photo: Jo-Anne McArthur / #MakeFurHistory / We Animals Media)

Most of us can hardly stomach reading descriptions of how animals are treated on Canadian fur farms.

However, witnessing it in person is even more gruesome. In 2014, I was able to set foot on a fur farm in Montérégie, and what I saw there will haunt me for the rest of my life.

Dark, filthy hangars full of dust and reeking of ammonia. Rows and rows of cages, as far as the eye can see. Tens of thousands of fearful little eyes staring at me.

The unnerving sound of tiny bodies circling incessantly in their wire cages.

And outside, in a clearing in the woods - ironically, an environment that could very well have been their natural habitat – a hundred or so foxes imprisoned in tiny, elevated cages. Dull-eyed animals aimlessly walking around in circles or pacing back and forth in their cages, some of them showing obvious signs of self-mutilation.

Even in 2014, I couldn’t conceive how such cruelty could be inflicted upon animals for the purpose of fashion. .

We are now in 2022, and it needs to end. With Bill C-247, we have the opportunity to do exactly that.

• Sophie Gaillard is a lawyer and the Director of Animal Advocacy and Legal Affairs at the Montreal SPCA.