Push for Exotic-Skins Ban to Head to Prada’s Boardroom
As a Shareholder, PETA Will Ask the Label to Follow Chanel’s Lead and Stop Selling Cruelly Obtained Exotic Skins
For Immediate Release:
April 29, 2019
Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382
Given that Prada is well aware of the extreme cruelty that goes into its products and has admitted that it can’t be sure what happens to the animals whose skin it uses, will the company agree to make unannounced visits to its suppliers with PETA to assess the welfare of the animals? That’s the question that a PETA representative will ask at Prada’s annual meeting in Milan tomorrow.
When: Tuesday, April 30, 12 noon
Where: Via Antonio Fogazzaro 28, Milan
“PETA is confident that if Prada executives were to see firsthand what’s done to the animals used to make its bags, watchbands, and shoes, it would stop selling exotic skins immediately,” says Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “If Chanel can ban exotic skins after acknowledging that it can’t obtain them ethically, Prada should follow suit and stop profiting from the suffering and death of ostriches, crocodiles, and other wild animals.”
PETA has released a video exposé of the world’s largest ostrich-slaughter companies, which supply Prada and other brands. The footage reveals that young birds are kept on barren dirt feedlots before being crammed into trucks, transported to slaughterhouses, and then electrically shocked before their throats are slit. Moments later, their feathers are torn from their still-warm bodies and they’re skinned and dismembered.
PETA exposés of the reptile-skins industry have uncovered further cruelty. At a crocodile farm in Vietnam, tens of thousands of crocodiles were kept in small, filthy concrete enclosures, some smaller than the length of their bodies. Workers electroshocked the animals and killed them by cutting their necks open and ramming metal rods down their spines. This killing method is inhumane, and experts report that crocodiles can remain conscious for over an hour after their spinal cord has been severed.
Photos of past PETA demonstrations outside Prada stores are available here. PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”—opposes speciesism, which is a human-supremacist view of the world. For more information, please visit PETA.org.
