“Life-Changing” Bans On Animal Circuses, Marine Parks, and Fur Farms Introduced in France
Wild animals currently held captive in circuses and marine parks to be rehomed, and mink fur farms to be outlawed, under new plans.
Animal welfare campaigners are celebrating after the French government introduced a number of sweeping measures that will transform the lives of captive animals across the country.
These include banning circuses from using wild animals, and putting an end to dolphins and orcas being held captive in marine parks.
The country’s four remaining mink fur farms will also be ordered to close.
The plans were outlined in a recent press conference by Barbara Pompili, France’s Ecology Minister, who explained that it is “time to open a new era in our relationship to these animals”.
“It is time that our ancestral fascination with these wild beings no longer translates into situations where their captivity is favored over their well-being”, Pompili said.
This new legislation would save some 500 wild animals, including bears, elephants, and lions, who are currently being made to perform as part of traveling circuses. The hope is that they will be rehomed in sanctuaries, and Pompili added that “solutions will be found on a case-by-case basis, with each circus, for each animal”.
The government is also committed to helping dolphins and orcas, who Pompili said “had an emotional intelligence and awareness of what was around them as well as a need for social links”.
As such, Pompili has prohibited the keeping of dolphins or orcas for entertainment purposes. An immediate ban has been placed on the import and breeding of new dolphins and orcas at the country’s three marine parks, and no new parks can now be built.
Most of the new laws will be imposed gradually, and a financial package of $9 million has been set aside to retrain the employees affected. "The transition will be spread over several years, because it will change the lives of many people. It will be a period when they will need support, and the state will be at their side", explained Pompili.
In addition, mink fur farms will be forced to close by 2025. This is a particularly unpopular practise in the country, with a recent poll revealing that 77 percent of French citizens oppose fur farming.
Public opinion was further influenced by undercover footage of horrific abuse on mink fur farms, published last month by the French animal rights group One Voice, and so campaigners are hopeful that the farms will shut down well before the deadline. Similarly, politicians in Poland - the third largest fur producer in the world - look set to outlaw fur farming, on the back of a whistleblower’s experience of working on a fur farm.
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