In 2024, the European Union held public consultations to review the fitness of the EU’s seal product ban regulations. The results of these public consultations are available now and reveal zero public feedback from people in Kalaallit Nunaat, or Greenland.
The lack of input from the Kalaallit/Greenlandic public is strange given the importance of seals and sealing to Kalaallit Nunaat. So why is the EU proceeding without them?
In 2009, the EU banned the import of seal products. The ban was revised in 2015 after a World Trade Organization ruling to permit two exceptions: certified Indigenous/Inuit pelts from subsistence hunting and personal-use items brought into the EU by people from their travels.
