Puss In Boots

WHEN reading the Times’s story that the European Commission is to ban the trade in dog and cat fur, we begin to wonder.

And our first thought is what happens to the rest of the family pet? When the fur is stripped to line coats and gloves, what happens to the meat?

The paper says that investigators in the US estimate that around two million dogs and cats are slaughtered for their coats each year.

And because cat fur is not to everyone’s taste, the pelts are disguised as fox or jackal or passed off as artificial fur. It seems that cat fur is even cheaper than the manmade stuff.

One part of us applauds the Chinese, who find such imaginative uses for Felix. Surely there are pollutants associated with making manmade fur that the world would be better off without. Cat fur is natural. And if it’s good enough for cats…

But the EU is unimpressed. Markos Kyprianou, the EU health and consumer protection commissioner, tells the Telegraph: “The message that we have received from EU consumers has been loud and clear. They do not find it acceptable to farm cats and dogs for their fur, nor do they want products containing such fur sold on the European market.”

And this is not protectionism, a way of safeguarding Europe’s beleaguered cat farmers. As Mr Kyprianou says in the Independent: “Cats and dogs in the EU are considered companion animals and nothing else and we have no tradition of using these animals for their fur.”

The Indy says 15 EU governments already ban the trade in cat and dog pelts. And these countries include France, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Poland and Italy.

So car fur is out. And mink, rabbit, ermine, fox, chinchilla, beaver, racoon, sable and leather can all stay.

Which makes us wonder what happens to the meat from those creatures?

And why that kebab is looking so familiar…

Posted: 21st, November 2006 | In: Uncategorized Comment | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink