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Be fur free: a consumer guide

The fur industry is responsible for the intense suffering and death of over 100 million animals every year. Animals that die to produce non-essential luxury items include rabbits, foxes, minks, raccoons, seals, wolves, coyotes, squirrels, cats and dogs.

85 percent of animals used to produce fur are commercially farmed.

Their stress-filled lives are devoid of the most basic natural behaviors: running, playing, burrowing, or even experiencing daylight.

These animals then face horrifically cruel methods of slaughter, including electrocution and live skinning, which preserves the pelt, but cause unimaginable pain.

To combat this industrial-scale cruelty, WSPA supports the world’s biggest anti-fur coalition: the Fur Free Alliance. Find out what you can do below.

Let’s kill off fur!

It is estimated that more animals die to meet current demand for fur trim than for entire fur coats: less fur per item is not less cruel
It is estimated that more animals die to meet current demand for fur trim than for entire fur coats: less fur per item is not less cruel
© iStock

The fur industry grows or declines with public demand.

Please consider the following information and pass it to friends and family:

  • There’s no such thing as ‘ethical’ or ‘green’ fur

The International Fur Trade Federation’s ‘Origin Assured’ label seeks to make fur farming respectable, but weak import and labeling regulations mean that in reality fur products are untraceable. Even if ‘humane fur farms’ could exist, the origin of consumer goods could not be assured.

The high-welfare fur myth was exposed in 2008 and 2009 by investigations into Norway’s fur farms, which proved that even a progressive developed nation claiming to produce ‘ethical fur’ is rearing animals in shocking conditions.

‘Green’ fur is also a marketing ploy: the animals come from commercial farms that generate industrial amounts of animal waste and offal, and their fur is processed using polluting toxic chemicals. Modern fur production carries a considerable environmental cost.

  • Fur trim is as cruel as a whole coat 

The majority of animals killed for fur end up in as fur trim, a sector of the industry worth billions of dollars a year. They are often subjected to even worse mistreatment than those used for full coats – as smaller pieces of fur are needed, there is even less care to prevent disfiguring injury or disease. Poor quality fur is simply discarded.

  • ‘Wild’ fur is not cruelty free

While fur farms are intensely cruel, traps and snares – capable of crushing bone – do not offer anything approaching a quick or compassionate end for animals caught in the wild, and they are indiscriminate about which species they catch.

Five steps to help protect animals from the fur trade

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