Reports

PDF Reports

Grey Seal Hunt Nova Scotia
Thousands Slaughtered as Nova Scotia Opens Protected Sanctuary to Seal Hunters

EFSA report to European Commission
Animal Welfare aspects of the killing and skinning of seals - Scientific Opinion of the Panel on Animal Health and Welfare

Global warming - IFAW
Seals on Thin Ice.
Global warming is resulting in dramatically reduced ice coverage in the Gulf of St Lawrence and off Newfoundland. Scientists have recorded poorer-than-average ice conditions off the East coast of Canada for the past 9 out of 11 years. The result—even more deaths for harp seal pups. In the face of this new threat, the commercial seal hunt must end.

Canada's commercial seal hunt: cruel and unsustainable
The Canadian seal hunt is the world’s largest marine mammal hunt. It is unacceptably cruel and biologically unsustainable, as documented in this report.

Canada's commercial seal hunt, not acceptably humane
When speaking on CNN's Larry King show, Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador, Danny Wil-liams made some shocking and untrue allegations against IFAW. Purporting to be speaking on behalf of Prime Minister Harper, Williams stated that "...people from the IFAW, independent scientists -- veterinarians have actually looked at this and said that this is humane"...this is simply not true. Prime Minister Harper, Premier Williams - it's time to tell the truth about the seal hunt. Keep reading to find out what veterinary groups really think about how humane the commercial seal hunt is.

Veterinary Report March 2001
CANADIAN COMMERCIAL SEAL HUNT. PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND
A report of an international veterinary panel, based on observations of the 2001 seal hunt, and a review of video footage of sealing activities recorded by IFAW from 1998-2000.

Public Morality and the Canadian Seal Hunt
The evidence of cruelty, and the sheer scale of this hunt, underlines our moral imperative to act. This report makes the case for banning the import of all seal products absolutely compelling.

Improving Humane Practice in the Canadian Harp Seal Hunt
This Report dated August 2005 and prepared by Bruce Smith of BLSmith Workgroup, details recommendations made by the Independent Veterinarians' Working Group. None of these recommendations were adopted by DFO, perhaps for the simple reason that the suggested recommendations cannot be implemented - the very nature of the seal hunt prevents the recommendations from being adopted and precludes it from ever being humane.

The Canadian Seal Hunt: No Management and No Plan
In 2003, the Canadian government began the implementation of its three-year Atlantic Seal Hunt Management Plan. This Management Plan allows the largest commercial hunt of harp seals since total allowable catches were first introduced in 1971. This report provides a histori-cal and ecological background against which the scientific justifiability and ecological sustain-ability of the current and proposed future Canadian harp seal hunts can be evaluated.

Seals and Sealing 2005

Seals and Sealing 2006

Seals and Sealing 2007

Harp Seal Populations in the North-western Atlantic -
Modelling Populations with Uncertainty
This report, released by Respect for Animals and the Humane Society International (UK), calls into question the very basis of the model used by the DFO to predict the number of harp seals in the Northwest Atlantic and the quota of seals it allows to be clubbed or shot to death each year.

Animal Welfare and the Harp Seal Hunt in Atlantic Canada
This is the report – also written by veterinarians who observed the commercial seal hunt in 2001 - from which the government and sealing proponents like to quote from time to time. However, read in its entirety it is far from the ringing endorsement of sealing that the government would have us believe. The veterinarian Pierre-Yves Daoust involved in this study is now director of the Fur Institute of Canada.

The Economics of the Canadian Sealing Industry
Published in 2001 by the Canadian Institute for Business and the Environment (CIBE) with fi-nancial support of International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), this Report is one of the most complete analyses of the income, expenditures and subsidies associated with the Atlantic Ca-nadian sealing industry. It highlights over $20 million in government subsidies given to the Atlantic sealing industry from 1995 to 2001. The chief finding of the report was that the high subsidies have failed to create a viable industry capable of standing on its own.