Are you willing to die for your shoes?

 Are you willing to die for your shoes?

The Ganges is one of the most polluted rivers in the world as a result of pollution from hundreds of leather industries. Serious respiratory and skin conditions, as well as high incidence of some cancers, are caused by exposure to the harsh chemicals routinely employed in the leather industry.

 

Around the year 2000, when People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India first opened for business, I made my first visit to a slaughterhouse. Since then, my coworkers and I have visited several slaughterhouses that shelter innumerable suffering animals. Having visited many slaughterhouses and followed the trucks, the narrative remains consistent. Contemplating, experiencing, seeing frightened cows and buffaloes being reduced to skin fragments for belts and coats. However, when they are mistreated, the same thing occurs.

Animals sometimes lead wretched lives in filthy farms in the first place. Then, they are pushed into cars so tightly that many of them are crushed or hurt by other people's horns, and some of them suffocate. When they get to the slaughterhouse, they are sometimes detained without food or drink for hours or days, suffering from gouged eyes or shattered bones. In the end, the laborers often slash their throats in front of onlookers or close victims. Even though many of these abuses are against the law, they nonetheless happen often.

Cattle are never raised in India just for meat or leather, a byproduct of the meat. However, a few years ago, India ranked first in the world and is a major exporter of beef. It is prohibited to transport cow flesh as buffalo meat, as tests have shown. India is a significant exporter of leather goods and the world's biggest producer of milk. This is not a coincidence at all. The dairy business provides the cattle that the meat and leather industries need to kill. Male calves and abandoned cows and buffaloes with decreased milk output are among these casualties.

The leather industry also mistreats people and pollutes the environment with its waste. India and Bangladesh started to embrace leather production as stringent labor and environmental regulations in developed nations encouraged it, pushing it to the periphery of Western industries. India and other emerging nations produced 60% of the leather used worldwide as of 2007. In locations where youngsters may be forced to labor in chemical-filled tanning vats or where pollutants may be dumped into rivers, the leather business is expanding.

The Ganga has become one of the most polluted rivers in the world due to pollution from hundreds of leather industries. Living close to or working in leather tanneries has been associated with increased risks of lung, bladder, and kidney cancers, as well as serious respiratory and skin conditions. Harsh chemicals like chromium, which are frequently used in the production of leather, have also been linked to these higher rates of cancer. The World Health Organization claimed a few years ago that 90% of tannery workers in Bangladesh's tannery industry perished before the age of 50 due to the extreme nature of the occupational dangers. In addition, a lot of tannery workers' children are taken advantage of.

It was stated around 20 years ago that over 17,170 hectares of agricultural land in several districts of Tamil Nadu had been harmed by tannery pollution, which resulted in the unemployment of over 36,056 farmers. It is believed that these numbers are underestimates. Agricultural land has been damaged and the promised compensation has not yet been paid in full, despite farmers seeking remedy from the Supreme Court via the Vellore Citizens Welfare Forum. This has been going on for many years. The forum claimed in their petition that the Palar River was receiving tannery waste dumps. Due to tannery contamination, the river's water was still referred to be "practically sludge" in 2022.

India is making 'no more' statements and moving toward ending the mistreatment of its residents, animals, and rivers. The Meghalayan government had said a few years before that it was investigating the possibility of turning pineapples into leather. The Central Leather Research Institute in Chennai uses plants like mango and agricultural waste to create vegan leather that is environmentally friendly.

Conditions are shifting elsewhere as well. In response to ethical consumer demands, Crocs has gone vegan; Aldo's Call It Spring, a global chain of hundreds of stores, is 100% cruelty-free; Swedish automaker Volvo intends to phase out leather; and an increasing number of retailers are carrying products made of plant leather as opposed to animal pelts.

By dressing in vegan clothing for that "killer look," we can all contribute to this positive shift.