{"id":175134,"date":"2010-01-13T13:00:32","date_gmt":"2010-01-13T18:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skyscrapercity.com\/showthread.php?t=1044643"},"modified":"2010-01-13T13:00:32","modified_gmt":"2010-01-13T18:00:32","slug":"china-gives-canada-its-approval-of-seal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/175134","title":{"rendered":"China gives Canada its approval of seal"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\t\t\t\tChina gives Canada its approval of seal<\/font>
\nFar from the outrage of Europe, Beijing fashion show bestows warm embrace
\nBy Bill Schiller Asia Bureau
\nPublished On Wed Jan 13 2010<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nA model, far left, wears a Canadian seal fur creation at a Beijing fashion show, while another model sports a Canadian-made fur design. (Jan. 12, 2010)
\nBILL SCHILLER\/TORONTO STAR<\/b><\/p>\n

BEIJING\u0096The fur didn’t fly here Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Instead, it strode down a Beijing catwalk without interruption.<\/p>\n

The Canadian seal and fur industry brought its fashion designs to a premier Beijing fashion show yesterday, winning warm applause.<\/p>\n

Had this been Europe there might have been cans of red paint hurled, incendiary banners held aloft, and outraged protest.<\/p>\n

But this is China.<\/p>\n

Here, where protests are banned and fur is popular, the show was a success \u0096 part of a larger strategy by the Harper government to work hand-in-hand with the Canadian seal industry to rebuild its challenged markets.<\/p>\n

Canada was effectively thumbing its nose at the European Union Tuesday, the organization that banned the importation of Canadian seal products last year.<\/p>\n

Instead, Canada has set about to woo the Chinese to open its gates to Canadian seal meat.<\/p>\n

Shunned by Brussels, Ottawa believes China will do nicely as a replacement market and has tremendous potential, especially with its 1.3 billion people.<\/b><\/p>\n

China already buys seal oil and fur from Canada. Meat would seem the next natural step.<\/p>\n

And success might be at hand.<\/p>\n

"We’re very optimistic we’ll be able to export seal meat into China," Canadian Fisheries Minister Gail Shea said here, following the fashion show featuring Canadian designs of sealskin and fur.<\/p>\n

As she spoke she wore a ribbon of seal fur on her label, a sign, she said, of her support for the Canadian seal hunt.<\/p>\n

There are two hunts per year: one in the Arctic held by Inuit, the other, larger one in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.<\/p>\n

More than 15,500 Canadians have seal hunting permits.<\/p>\n

Shea said her delegation had good discussions with Chinese officials, as well as with importers who normally handle Canadian fish imports.<\/p>\n

The Chinese don’t normally eat seal meat. They have a small number of seals in the country, but they’re protected.<\/p>\n

Canadian officials said the Chinese would cultivate a taste for the delicacy \u0096 not a tall task given their prized and inventive culinary culture.<\/p>\n

"We’re now at what we think is the end of a process of formally lifting those restrictions (on seal meat)," said Mike Pearson, director general of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, who was part of the talks.<\/p>\n

Neither he nor the minister, however, would predict when China will allow Canadian seal imports.<\/p>\n

Shea arrived here Sunday on a 72-hour trip \u0096 her first to China \u0096 to attend the 36th China Fur and Leather Products Fair, and discuss fisheries’ issues with senior Chinese officials.<\/p>\n

But developing the seal market appears to be her priority.<\/p>\n

"We’d like to expand the market," she said in an interview. "China has a huge population and very good potential as a market for Canada."<\/p>\n

Traditionally the Chinese were interested only in pelts, but in recent years they’ve begun buying omega-3 oils. Now there is research into developing a protein powder as well as the potential use of seal heart valves for transplantation into in humans.<\/p>\n

"This (latter) is an exciting project with potential benefit to the entire world," she said.<\/p>\n

More and more researchers are looking at using the "whole" animal and they see "tremendous opportunity. Exports in Canada’s $13-million seal industry were valued at $10 million last year.<\/p>\n

A Fisheries spokesman said Canada exported $1.1 million in seal fats and oil to China in 2009, while an unknown percentage in pelts went to the country after being manufactured into boots and other clothing.<\/p>\n

Canada has seemed much more aggressive about standing up for the industry since last spring, when Governor General Micha\u00eblle Jean ate a slaughtered seal’s raw heart while visiting an Inuit community near Rankin Inlet, Nunavut.<\/p>\n

The event captured massive media attention at home and abroad.<\/p>\n

Asked at the time whether she was doing it to send a message to the Europeans, Jean replied, "Take from that what you will."<\/p>\n

Said Shea, "It was a great show of support for the Canadian sealing industry."<\/p>\n

But no one has persuaded the EU to reverse its ban on seal products.<\/p>\n

Today the government is appealing the European Union’s decision to the World Trade Organization.<\/p>\n

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http:\/\/www.thestar.com\/news\/world\/ch…proval-of-seal<\/a><\/p>\n

Bravo. :applause:<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Quote: China gives Canada its approval of seal Far from the outrage of Europe, Beijing fashion show bestows warm embrace By Bill Schiller Asia Bureau Published On Wed Jan 13 2010 A model, far left, wears a Canadian seal fur creation at a Beijing fashion show, while another model sports a Canadian-made fur design. (Jan. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2820,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-175134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2820"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175134\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}