After years of monitoring records generated by US Department of Agriculture inspectors that document horrific mistreatment of birds inside poultry slaughter plants, AWI is lobbying Congress to require increased oversight of bird handling at slaugh
On Saturday, Congress approved its Fiscal Year 2015 $1.1 trillion spending bill. Within the 1,603-page piece of legislation, which will fund the federal government through September 30, 2015, federal lawmakers included provisions that can be marked as both triumphs and setbacks for wild and domestic animals. The bill now makes its way to President Obama for his signature into law.
Today, the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), joined by 46 public health scientists, veterinarians, animal welfare and conservation organizations, and other experts in their respective fields, delivered a letter to leaders of the Agriculture Committees in the US House of Representatives and Senate expressing strong opposition to a provision in the House Farm Bill (H.R. 8467) that would earmark taxpayer dollars for the mink industry to develop and expand into international markets.
Congressional leaders are calling on the Bush Administration to stand up for whales at this month's annual International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting in Chile.
Joining with a growing public chorus of outrage at a recent proposal by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and their Wild Horse Advisory board to euthanize up to 33,000 wild horses, several leaders in the US House of Representatives sent a letter to the agency stressing their strong opposition to any such effort.
When Congress hustled out of town in September, it left a lot of unfinished business. Both the House Agriculture Committee and the full Senate had approved amendments to their farm bills that would prohibit attending or bringing a child to an animal fight.
A coalition of international animal protection and conservation organizations has urgently asked the Obama administration to impose economic sanctions against Icelandic companies with corporate ties to the commercial whaling industry.
More than 150 conservation groups have signed a letter to President Obama asking him to oppose all policy “riders” that would undermine the Endangered Species Act during negotiations on final spending legislation for Fiscal Year 2016.
Following the federally authorized gunshot death of a mother red wolf—a critically endangered species—in the Red Wolf Recovery Area of eastern North Carolina, conservation groups today demanded the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) ensure the survival of the world’s only wild red wolf population, including an unknown number of puppies mothered by this wolf.
Conservation groups are calling on the International Whaling Commission (IWC) and its member governments to condemn Iceland’s commercial whale hunt following confirmation that the Icelandic whaling company Hvalur hf has killed yet another endangered fin whale.
A coalition of conservation and animal protection organizations confirmed today that more than 1,500 metric tons of products from endangered Icelandic fin whales were shipped to Japan in July 2016. The discovery comes just prior to the 17th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (CoP17) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which starts in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 24.
WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation and the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) have discovered that, in the latest desperate effort to prop up a dying industry, Hvalur hf, Iceland’s fin whaling company, has joined forces with Aquaship, a shipping company with a troubling record, to transport meat from endangered fin whales through Russian waters to Japan.
Conservation organizations launched an online campaign this week entitled “The Truth about Red Wolves,” aimed at building support for the dwindling population of the world’s only wild red wolves in North Carolina. The campaign is currently advertised on The Outer Banks Voice.
Conservation groups filed a petition today urging the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to ban the import and sale of threatened Banggai cardinalfish from Indonesia.
On behalf of the Red Wolf Coalition, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Animal Welfare Institute, the Southern Environmental Law Center today sued the US Fish and Wildlife Service in the US District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina for violations of the Endangered Species Act caused by new, illegal agency policies that bar the use of proven management measures to save wild red wolves.
Conservation groups filed a complaint late yesterday in the US District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina against the US Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) for its failure to protect the world’s only wild population of red wolves and its illegal action in authorizing the killing of a breeding female red wolf. The conservation groups involved in the litigation include the Red Wolf Coalition, Defenders of Wildlife and the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), and are represented by the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC).
Responding to the United Nations’ recent decision to award Japan a much coveted non-permanent seat on the Security Council, 65 conservation and animal protection organizations opposed to Japan’s commercial whaling are protesting to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon that Japan’s recent conduct does not befit such a privilege.
Today, the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), In Defense of Animals (IDA), the American Environment Foundation (AEF), and two individuals asked the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) of the US Department of the Interior in a 14-page letter to cancel an illegal black bear hunt scheduled for Dec.1 and 2 in the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge.
On the day before Mexico’s National Day of Conservation, conservation groups are calling on the Mexican government to enact forceful protective measures to save the critically endangered vaquita, a tiny porpoise species that only inhabits the upper Gulf of California.
Local conservationists rallied outside the Mexican Embassy today in support of the vaquita marina, the world’s smallest and most endangered porpoise, found only in Mexico’s Gulf of California. Participating organizations and individuals urged the Mexican government to enforce a permanent ban on gillnets in the Gulf to save the species, which number less than 100. The rally was held in recognition of International Save the Vaquita Day 2015, to be observed on Saturday, July 11.
Pocatell, ID – Today a coalition of conservation organizations sued the U.S. Forest Service for failure to require permits and environmental impacts analysis for the advertised "Coyote and Wolf Derby" in Salmon, Idaho, December 28 and 29..
New World primates have evolved over millions of years and have developed complex physiological, anatomical and behavioral adaptations to live in Neotropical forests (Figure l). Caretakers should seek knowledge of the natural lifestyles of the primates in their charge, and attempt to reproduce in the captive environment the salient aspects of the natural habitats that are biologically relevant to the animals.
The Animal Welfare Institute has sent letters of warning to restaurants in major cities that offer shark fin soup on their menus. In addition, the organization is working to expand its campaign from Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, New York City, Chicago, Boston and San Francisco to the entire nation.
A new poll commissioned by members of the Make Stewardship Count coalition indicates that the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) could face a significant erosion of consumer confidence as a result of the certification body’s inattention to a number of critical issues, including the bycatch of endangered and threatened species, the deliberate encirclement of dolphins, shark finning and habitat destruction.
