H&M Shareholder Resolution From PETA Calls for Renewed Mohair Ban After Workers Caught Beating Goats

For Immediate Release:
March 16, 2026

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

PETA has submitted a shareholder resolution to H&M calling on the company to reinstate the mohair ban it abandoned in 2020 despite previously professing to ban it “permanently.” PETA points to a damning new PETA Asia investigation into so-called “Responsible Mohair Standard” (RMS) farms—one of which sells mohair through BKB, the world’s largest supplier of RMS mohair and an H&M partner—which reveals goats being beaten, cut open, and left for dead despite the farms’ “humane” and “ethical” claims.

H&M originally cut ties with the mohair industry in 2018 after reviewing a previous PETA exposé of 12 South African farms that revealed goat kids crying out in fear as they were roughly handled and shorn, and a worker slowly cutting the throats of fully conscious goats with a dull knife and then breaking their necks.

Despite their claims and even after PETA provided H&M with evidence of the standard cruel procedures allowed by RMS—including castration without pain medication, slicing off parts of goats’ ears for identification, and slaughter when their production declines—H&M used RMS as an excuse to reintroduce mohair in 2020.

Credit: PETA

“H&M can’t claim to care about animals while supporting the mohair industry, which mutilates, whips, and drags terrified goats to their deaths,” says PETA President Tracy Reiman. “The only humane materials are vegan, and PETA is calling on H&M to ban mohair immediately.”  

PETA notes that mother goats form strong bonds with their babies and that both mother and baby recognize each other’s distinct calls—or “bleats”—shortly after birth. In the mohair industry, goat kids are shorn starting as early as 6 months old. As soon as their hair quality declines or they’re deemed no longer useful, the goats are killed—well short of their natural 10-year life expectancy.

Nearly 300 major retailers worldwide have banned mohair in response to PETA’s video exposés of the industry, including Zara, Gap, Banana Republic, Forever 21, UNIQLO, Anthropologie, Ralph Lauren, and Express, among others.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear or abuse in any other way”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.