Video: Baby seals are still being clubbed to death
The annual Namibian seal cull begins tomorrow. It's the largest slaughter of marine mammals on earth and considered to be the most brutal with one man laughing all the way to the bank.
From the 1st of July every year, 80 000 unweaned Cape Fur seal pups are beaten to death for their fur pelts. And you thought wearing fur was taboo.
Sex potions
A further 6 000 adult bull seals will be shot at point blank range so that their penises can be used to make sex potions for the Asian markets, thus further fueling the illegal trade in animal body parts for traditional medicines.
For 139 days
For the next 139 days, terrified pups will be rounded up, separated from their mothers and violently beaten to death. Pups, bulls and cows will be surrounded and kept away from the safety of the sea.
The Namibian government defends its industry claiming seals consume about 700,000 metric tons of fish a year and must be killed. When commercial sealing was ended in South Africa in the 1990’s, the fishing industry was not impacted negatively, but rather, improved.
Quota increased
Namibia plans to increase the size of its annual seal cull in an effort to create jobs. From July  to November, approximately 160 part-time workers are hired to kill the seals, mostly pups between the ages of 7 and 11 months.
Each year, despite massive international criticism, flawed science, mounting public outcry and warnings from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the quota gets increased.
Warning: Not for sensitive viewers
One man laughing all the way to the bank
The cull is mostly driven by one man. Hatem Yavuz has the contract to buy every skin from the Namibian cull until 2019. He and others make thousands of dolllars on each seal fur coat while paying sealers and processors an average of $228 for the entire killing season.
