Is that better or worse for North American Trappers than NAFA Folding? I am new to this side of things so I am just trying to learn by reading and asking.

Boco and the Beav will carpool to the NAFA stop. Anybody else want a ride?

I started trapping in the mid-70's. Prices weren't great, but better than the minimum wage of $2.15 per hour. I was in central Oregon, at the time. A year or two after my start, coyotes went sky high. I was a better shot than a coyote trapper, but managed to catch a few, too. I sold to a fellow in Salem, Oregon. Small potatoes, but made great money, for the day.
I heard rumors of ranch fox and mink, but never thought "they" might effect my bottom line.
For the last couple of decades, ranch fur has dictated the bottom line of every wild fur producer. Once in a boom, for the better, but for the most part, not.
The story that "we" need "them" is non-sense. Trappers produce millions of pelts annually. Lotting by professionals assures like furs for sewing, and the market can absorb them, annually.
Ranched goods, easily produced, uniformly colored, sized, and packaged has been the demise of wild fur.
Mc'coats are NOT beneficial for what we collectively do. The idea that making a luxery item "affordable" to the masses has failed historically, and has done so, again.

Brussels, June 19, 1997

Animal trapping standards

Statement by Sir Leon Brittan An international agreement to ban the worst "leg-hold" traps and enforce humane standards on the rest will do much more for animal welfare than a mere ban on fur imports, says Sir Leon Brittan, EU Trade Commissioner, as EU Ministers prepare for a decision today. The first-ever international trapping standard, negotiated with Canada and Russia, would dramatically cut cruelty to wild animals by forcing Canada and Russia - and the EU itself - to abolish the worst forms of trapping, on pain of sanctions if they fail to do so. Trappers in the remotest corners of Siberia and the Yukon are unlikely to change their age-old ways unless obliged to do so by their own governments, and helped in the process. A mere import ban may have instant appeal, but it will could prove unenforceable, and will send the fur business in search of lucrative markets elsewhere. It may also put Europe on a collision course with its trading partners.

"European Ministers face a major decision at the Environment Council today or tomorrow on the question of curbing the use of cruel animal traps. The issue will have immense repercussions on animal welfare, the fur business and the international trading system. It is a highly emotive issue, and understandably so. But it has become unnecessarily polarised, because it is not an argument between those who want to advance the cause of animal welfare and those who do not. More light and less heat are needed in the public debate if Europe's Ministers are to take the right decision.

There is no doubt in my mind that trapping can be a cruel business, and that Europe has a duty to improve animal welfare. Indeed, opposition to the killing of animals at all is a perfectly respectable position to hold. If you believe that Europe should ban the fur trade on principle, do not read on. But if you believe that it is more realistic for Europe to do all within its power to make the fur trade a far less cruel and more humane business, then the only question is how best to achieve that.

Two of the options facing Ministers are as follows: the first is to ban all imports into Europe of furs from countries where "leg-hold" traps are used until trapping methods are changed. The second is to approve a set of rules that would force all trappers to use only the most humane methods and abandon the rest, and face penalties if they do not.

An import ban has instant appeal. It is a gesture of defiance that would make many animal-lovers, who rightly despise cruelty, feel good. But a gesture is essentially all it is. It will damage the livelihood of remote communities, many of them indigenous tribes in Russia and Canada, and will compound the huge social problems they already face. It will not persuade them to improve their traps or abandon trapping altogether. Communities that have depended on trapping for centuries will go in search of lucrative markets elsewhere, and they will almost certainly find them.

Even those opposing the fur trade on principle should recognise, therefore, that an EU import ban on furs coming from countries that allow the use of the leghold trap does not guarantee any improvement in animal welfare.

The second option - a set of rules to improve trapping standards - has one major advantage over an import ban: it has the backing of the host governments themselves, and is therefore enforceable. Trappers spread across Siberia or the Yukon are not going to change their age-old habits without tough enforcement laws, cooperation and support from their own authorities.

The European Commission, at the request of the fifteen EU governments, has negotiated an international trapping standard with Canada and Russia, two of the main trapping nations. We are continuing to negotiate with the United States.

This agreement will cover all mechanical traps for restraining or killing animals. An import ban, on the other hand, would only cover the leg-hold trap which sadly does not have a monopoly on animal cruelty. If the agreement is approved by European Ministers, it would be an ambitious step towards binding, international, scientifically based standards on humane trapping which currently do not exist. The International Standards Organisation has tried for ten years to define such norms, without success.

Canada will be bound, under international law, to ban for ever the cruel "steel-jawed" leg trap immediately for seven species - beaver, marten, otter, fisher, ermine, muskrat and badger - and in three years for five larger animals - coyote, wolf, lynx, bobcat and racoon. Russia will effectively be required to ban all leg traps by the end of the century. All other traps must meet strictly defined pain thresholds and killing times set by independent scientific experts if they continue to be used. This will reduce animal pain and suffering substantially, if not completely. The rules can also be toughened further on the basis of future research after three years. All traps that fail to meet the standard must be phased out by law over a specific time period. If the governments fail to act, they too will face international arbitration which could lead to trade sanctions. Going into these details in an agreement is a gruesome business, but it will have a practical effect. It will work better than any import ban because it tackles the problem at source - by improving the trap itself - rather than at Europe's borders, when it is too late.

The international agreement will force Europe to put its own house in order, too, while an import ban will not. Farmers in this country trap millions of animals a year to control pests. There is virtually nothing - besides a widely flouted ban on leg-hold traps - that actually obliges them to kill as humanely as possible. This agreement would apply the same rigorous criteria to all mechanical traps throughout Britain and the rest of Europe.

An import ban would almost certainly be attacked as illegal under world trade rules. This may cut little ice with animal activists, but if the European Union was accused at the World Trade Organisation of restricting imports unfairly and it lost the case, as past jurisprudence suggests could well happen, we would have to repeal the ban. If not, some of our major trading partners would be free to ban Europe's exports of other products or demand hefty compensation. The credibility of Europe's campaign to stop other countries penalising our trade on spurious grounds would be severely impaired, and the innocent victims in this affair - the animals themselves - would have won nothing".