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First-Ever Eyewitness Investigation of Mohair Industry Shows Workers Slowly Killing, Mutilating Crying Goats
London – A breaking PETA video exposé of the mohair industry in South Africa
– the source of more than 50 per cent of the world's mohair – has
prompted several top international retailers, including Arcadia Group,
Gap Inc, Inditex, and H&M Group, to ban mohair.
PETA Asia's investigation, which is the first of its kind and encompasses 12 farms visited in January and February
of this year, revealed that workers dragged goats by the horns and legs
and lifted them off the floor by the tail, which could break their
spines. Goat kids being shorn for the first time cried out in fear.
Afterwards, workers threw them across the floor. PETA US is asking
law-enforcement agencies to investigate and file charges, as
appropriate, for what the group believes are violations of South
Africa's Animals Protection Act, 1962.
"Baby
goats were left screaming in pain and fear on the shearing floor, all
for mohair jumpers and scarves," says PETA Director of Corporate
Projects Yvonne Taylor. "PETA is urging shoppers to check clothing
labels carefully, and if an item says it contains mohair, leave it on
the rack."
PETA
– whose motto reads, in part, that "animals are not ours to wear" –
notes that many goats' sensitive ears were mutilated with pliers, which
left the animals screaming in pain. Shearers – who are paid by volume,
not by the hour – worked quickly and carelessly, leaving goats cut up
and bleeding, and roughly stitched them up without giving them any pain
relief.
Farmers
admitted that after shearing, many goats die from exposure to the cold
wind and rain – 40,000 reportedly died of exposure across South Africa
in just one weekend. Unwanted goats also died in agonising ways: on one
farm, a worker slowly cut the throats of fully conscious goats with a
dull knife and then broke their necks, hacking one animal's head right
off. Others were hauled to an abattoir, where they were electrically
shocked, hung upside down, and slashed across the throat.
Arcadia
Group will no longer purchase mohair for any of its eight brands, which
include Topshop and Miss Selfridge, and Gap Inc will no longer obtain
mohair products for Gap and its other brands. Inditex's seven apparel
brands, which include Zara, and H&M Group's eight brands will be
mohair-free by 2020.
For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk.
Distributed by Pressat
No media attached. Please contact PETA for more information.