Adidas CEO slams ‘terrible’ kangaroo leather industry and pledges to stop purchasing skins from Australia
Adidas CEO Björn Gulden has called the commercial kangaroo leather industry “terrible” at a recent shareholder meeting, suggesting the company will stop purchasing skins from Australia.
While this admission, along with the claim, “We will certainly, maybe, switch faster than you think,” isn’t exactly a pledge, animal rights groups are calling for the chief to stand by these convictions, made amidst protests against the practice of using kangaroo skins in football boots.
“Adidas’s CEO has publicly acknowledged the mass shooting of kangaroos in Australia is cruel and implied that the company may stop purchasing skins from kangaroos shot in the wild,” Jennifer Skiff, from the Washington D.C-based Center for a Humane Economy, said.
“We encourage him to make that announcement soon, since the worldwide animal welfare community is deeply concerned that Adidas is an outlier on this issue and its sourcing of skins violates its publicly stated policies about the humane treatment of animals.”
Adidas pledged to end its role in the kangaroo-skin trade in 2012, but has continued to use the leather in its products.
“Adidas must divorce itself from the world’s largest slaughter of land mammals for a product nobody needs and that its competitors have already shunned,” said Wayne Pacelle, president of the Center for a Humane Economy.
“The only reason the commercial shooting of kangaroos and the orphaning of their joeys occurs is because non-Australian companies like Adidas buy up the skins. End the purchase of the skins and the commercial kill collapses.”
Last year, Nike, New Balance, and Puma all announced plans to stop participating in the commercial skin trade.
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Complete greenwashing BS. Kangaroos are vermin and producing Kangaroo leather is far more sustainable than sending millions of pairs of plastic football boots that last one season out into the world every year. This bloke should go to jail for what he’s doing, it’s poisoning the planet instead of using a natural resource that is the direct output of sustainable population control.
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The commercial slaughter of kangaroos by the kangaroo industry is inherently cruel and absolutely not sustainable, it is a profit driven industry and is not for population control; or damage mitigation (Olsen & Lowe, 2006). Politicians and pro industry advocates continue to push the propaganda that killing kangaroos is necessary to control their population and protect agriculture to gain public and government support for the commercial industry.
There is absolutely no science to prove it, but there is plenty of science to contradict it, for instance:
The independent THINKK Research Group (UTS, University of Technology Sydney), confirms that emerging science does not support the view that kangaroos are overabundant in open landscapes or competitive with livestock for resources.
It is in fact biological impossible for kangaroo populations to increase rapidly. They grow and breed slowly and have a high juvenile mortality rate. The maximum wild population growth rates averages~10% in optimal conditions with annual declines of up to and over 60% during drought recorded.
‘If left undisturbed in continuing optimal natural conditions, kangaroo populations do not keep infinitely increasing, but tend towards equilibrium or stability.’ (kangaroosatrisk.org)
Kangaroos are not farmed, they are shot at night, it is the world’s largest land based wildlife slaughter. Wounded kangaroos die slow in agony and joeys are bashed to death or left to starve. I am an academic and volunteer wildlife carer in Victoria, Australia. Since the re-introduction of the commercial industry we had an increase of 55% call outs to injured kangaroos( jaws and part of the head blown off, left for weeks to die) and a whooping 500% increase of orphaned joeys ( wildlife victoria)!
Please read the facts from independent macropod experts and scientists!
Hopefully adidas will join Nike Puma and new Balance in making the switch from kangaroo skin to cruelty free materials and spare these gentle and precious animals the cruelty they don’t deserve!
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Also need to abandon the cruel mass killing of cows for cow leather. Unnecessary cruelty that is not necessary.
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