Catriona MacLennan: Cats and dogs victims of barbaric fur trade

New Zealanders are a nation of cat and dog lovers.

The Animal Welfare Act provides legal protections for animals in this country, requiring that they be properly cared for and protected from unnecessary pain and distress. Animals being killed or transported must be treated humanely.

However, New Zealanders may be unwittingly supporting cruel treatment of cats and dogs in other countries by buying products made from their fur.

The international fur trade is a US$2 billion ($3.8 billion) industry. Most of that fur comes from China, and some of it is from cats and dogs. It is estimated that about two million cats and dogs are slaughtered in Asia each year for their fur.

The industry is a secretive one, as manufacturers are aware of sensitivities in other countries about the treatment of cats and dogs. However, a number of covert videos have been shot in recent years and smuggled out of China.

These show in graphic detail the horrifying cruelty of the trade. Most of the cats and dogs are reared in small backyard operations, where they are confined to ramshackle, filthy cages.

Hundreds of dogs and cats are then crammed into large metal crates and packed on to lorries to be transported long distances. To unload the trucks, the crates are thrown from a height on to the ground. Many of the animals' limbs shatter from the impact. Long metal poles are used to beat and prod the terrified cats and dogs to keep them from reaching out of the cages.

There are no laws governing how the animals must be killed, so they are bludgeoned with hammers, beaten to death, strangled with wire nooses or hung by their legs and paws until they bleed to death. Video of cats and dogs being skinned alive has also been shot and smuggled out of China. One New Zealand animal advocacy campaigner, who has been working in the field for more than 20 years, described it as the cruellest sight he had ever witnessed.

Some of the animals used in the trade have collars around their necks, indicating that they were, at one time, pets.

The fur is commonly used to decorate clothes such as coats and gloves, but may also be present on a range of other products. These include handbags, toys, fur-covered knick-knacks, paint brushes, gardening and golf gloves, drums and other musical instruments, car upholstery and medicinal products.

Exposure of the horrifying trade has let to public outcries in other countries in recent years, followed by government action to ban importation of the fur.

The United States was the first to act, prohibiting cat and dog fur from being brought into its jurisdiction. That resulted in more fur products being sent to Europe but the European Union has now also banned the imports. The products are already illegal in Australia.

As more countries act to ban the goods from their borders, the concern is that New Zealand could become an increasingly attractive destination for the trade. There is no way of knowing how much cat and dog fur is being imported into this country.

As the products are not illegal, there is no monitoring to check for feline and canine trim. However, there has been a 44 per cent increase in fur imports from Asia into New Zealand in the past nine years.

Manufacturers are aware that cats and dogs are highly valued as pets in the countries in which the goods are sold, so the fur is often falsely labelled.

As well as being described as artificial or synthetic, it is also labelled as gae-wolf, Asian wolf, China wolf, goupee, rabbit, and maopee. The fur may also be dyed, making it hard to distinguish from other furs - which have also been produced in cruel conditions.

The New Zealand Government could take a simple step to ensure that this country does not support the cat and dog fur trade. All that is required is an amendment to the Customs and Excise Act 1996 to add feline and canine fur to the schedule of prohibited products.

This would make the importation of garments and other goods containing the fur illegal, and would allow Customs to carry out random monitoring.

The Government has shown it can act speedily to pass legislation when it chooses to. Surely it can find time to make a small law change which, in turn, would make a small contribution to ending a barbaric trade?

* Catriona MacLennan is a South Auckland barrister and author.