04/04/22 Stop the Opening of the First Octopus Farm!
Animal Friends Croatia this year, through legal amendments, seeks complete protection of cephalopods
- On April 3rd, in main Zagreb square: activists with signs raised a voice for octopus salvation
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On Sunday, 3. April 2022, on Zagreb Ban Jelačić Square, Animal Friends Croatia gathered with signs stating “Free Octopus” and “Stop the Octopus Farm – Stop this Cruelty” and supporting the international protest against the opening of the first octopus farm in the world. Simultaneous gatherings were also held in New York, México, Athens, London, Edinburgh, Bogota, Madrid, Barcelona, Sydney, Sevilla and numerous other cities, due to company Nueva Pescanova announcement of their intention to open an octopus farm in Spain, opposed by organizations and animal friends across the world.
Along with Animal Friends Croatia, this protest was supported by more than 75 world organizations for the protection and rights of animals, such as PETA, Essere Animali, Aquatic Life Institute, Compassion in World Farming (CIWF), Party for the Animals, Animal Justice Party, as well as philosopher and writer Peter Singer, the author of famous books „Animal Liberation”.
Dr. Elena Lara, Research Head of CIWF on intensive octopus farm cultivation, points out that octopuses are social and very intelligent animals, who like people, feel pain and emotions and due to that condemnation to an isolated life in a tank would seriously impact their wellbeing. She points out that, due to non-existing protection laws, they would on farms be completely unprotected from suffering and cruel methods of execution: „It would be irresponsible for legislators to allow this. Octopus and all other animals require a law that will protect them.”
Animal Friends Croatia agrees with this and will seek that through amendments to the Animal Protection Act this year, these cephalopods are also included, who are also known to use tools and for having highly sophisticated areal navigation and memory. „Even though cephalopods have a well-developed nervous system and the largest brain and are considered as the most intelligent of all invertebrates, The Law on Animal Protection is applied only to invertebrate members Cephalopods used for experiments. They are continued to be tortured and killed for food regardless of research proving that fish and cephalopods can feel fear and other complex emotions that contribute to their ability to feel suffering”, Animal Friends Croatia warns.
They furthermore state that extreme damage to sea animals, besides cultivation, is also caused by fishing, especially the use of nets that destroy animal organisms on the sea bottom causing indescribable damage to the entire planet. „On a daily basis, we witness the suffering of billions of animals in the world because of food cultivation, fun, various testing, etc. The intention of opening the octopus farm confirms how we, as species, are greedy and how we shamelessly enslave and kill the animals we are dependent on for surviving on Earth. We join the scientific community and other organizations in protests against octopus farming”, Animal Friends Croatia concludes.
They invite everyone to view the excellent film on Netflix „My Octopus Teacher”.
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