World Business Press Online, OTTAWA - Canada, which culls hundreds of thousands of seals each year, will launch a formal protest with the World Trade Organization.

European foreign ministers agreed to ban the import of seal products across the bloc's 27 nations. The products from "hunts conducted for the sole purpose of sustainable management of marine resources" may only be marketed on a not-for-profit basis. EU countries now have nine months to implement the new legislation. EU diplomats said that the ban - which will affect the 2010 hunting season - would stop an annual trade of some 4.2 million euros.

The decision comes after years of appeals from animal rights campaigners.

"The sealing industry is crucial to many small coastal communities and to Northern aboriginal people, where few economic opportunities exist," International Trade Minister Stockwell Day and Fisheries Minister Gail Shea said on Monday. "In caving to the pressure from NGOs for a seal product ban, European Union has taken short-sighted and irresponsible actions that will affect many Canadian livelihoods," she added.

Last year, Canada exported about $3.5 million worth of seal products to the EU. The federal government estimates the ban could cost some 6,000 sealers in Canada up to 35 per cent of their earnings. Every year Canada kills about 300,000 seals off its east coast - the biggest such hunt in the world. The animals' pelts, fat and meat are traded. Government in Ottawa says the decision of EU is not based on science, environmental or humanitarian concerns and it will challenge it at the World Trade Organization.

"It is in our view inappropriate that a trade decision is taken which is not based on the science, and for that reason, we are announcing that we'll be pursuing an appeal of this vote today." ... „We are very disappointed with this ruling. We believe strongly this violates the World Trade Organization guidelines," said minister Day.
The founding president of the Canadian Sealers Association Jim Winter said to CTV that the organization was happy Canada was taking action through the WTO, but said it should have been done years ago.

The ban does exempt products that stem from traditional seal hunts carried out by the Inuit, as well as traditional hunts in Greenland, Alaska and Russia. Jim Winter told CTV that it's not enough as the seal product bans end up hurting the Inuit communities the most, more than other parts of the east-north coast of Canada: "The Inuits themselves know that it is not enough. If you go back to the 1980's, when the ban was emplaced the impact on Inuit community in Canada was absolutely horrific."

"We are particularly concerned that the views of Canada's Inuit have not been considered by the EU. They have made themselves quite clear that an exemption will not help them, yet European officials persist in pretending that it will."... These worries were echoed by both federal ministers in Ottawa: "A ban will not improve animal living standard or stop seal hunt. However it will have significant negative economic effects on fishers and small coastal communities and the Inuit."

David Barry of the Fur Institute of Canada, called the ban irresponsible and political that would affect at least 12,000 commercial seal hunt licences. He also said the ban would affect other industries that rely on wild resources. According to him, the ban will not compromise main seal product markets. Russia and China were developing markets for seal skin and oil, he said, while markets for meat are found in Northern communities and Newfoundland.

The means of the hunt, or harvest as it is called in Canada, are extremely controversial. Hunters usually shoot the seals or bludgeon them to death with spiked clubs. Canada has insisted that the hunt is carried out humanely. "Associations of veterinarians and others have determined that Canada's hunt is indeed humanitarian, scientific and follows environmental rules of sustainability," minister Day said.

Critics say that Canadian government's claims about the seal hunt being humane and the clubbing not the most common method used are incorrect. Rebecca Aldworth, director of the Humane Society International Canada, said government reports show that 97 per cent of seals killed during the hunt are less than three months of age. Other anti-hunt campaigners say the practice is inhumane, and claim that some seals are skinned while still conscious. That is why they welcomed the EU ban.

"We expect the commercial seal hunt to continue its inevitable decline until it is wiped out once and for all," Lesley O'Donnell of the International Fund for Animal Welfare said to BBC. While in 2006 the price for the seal pelts was $105, last year it dropped to mere $30 and projections for the 2009 market are even lower - only $15.

Miroslava Hospodarova