Canada

Our Impact

More than 80,000 animal species range across Canada’s vast and varied environments. Unfortunately, many of these wild animals face threats from humans. Each year, millions are subjected to cruel practices such as the global trade in wild animal parts, trophy hunting, captivity, wildlife culls and more.

What we are working on

Companion animals are confined to puppy and kitten mills, roam the streets, or live in remote communities where their families can’t access the pet care resources they need. Tens of millions of pigs, cows, chickens and other animals are raised on factory farms and slaughtered for human consumption each year. And animals hidden in labs undergo painful, invasive and often needless testing.

Photo of a female coyote and her pup in the wild.

Tom and Pat Leeson

Trophy hunting

Trophy hunting is the unethical practice of killing wildlife for entertainment to obtain the animal’s body or its parts, such as head, teeth, horns or tails, for display as a trophy. It is not only unethical killing of animals, but can harm conservation efforts by exacerbating direct and indirect threats facing many imperiled species.

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Humane World for Animals

Abuse/neglect

We work globally and locally to address animal abuse and neglect. These efforts include education initiatives, policy coordination and facilitating implementation. We also train law enforcement and government officials on animal cruelty investigation and prosecution and collaborate on humane animal control efforts.

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Kristo Muurimaa

End fur farming

Millions of animals suffer and die every year for fashion. Confined in small, wire-mesh cages on factory farms or captured by brutal metal traps in the wild, their fur is turned into frivolous keychain trinkets or trim on coats and hats. Animals need fur—people don't. We're fighting to end fur farming worldwide.

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Horses in trailer headed to slaughterhouse

Kathy Milani/The HSUS

Horse protection

Every year, Canada exports thousands of live horses by air to Japan for slaughter. Confined in small wooden crates, often multiple animals per crate without segregation, these horses endure a long and stressful journey without food, water or rest, only to be killed for their meat. Humane World for Animals Canada is working toward a federal ban on the live export of horses by air for slaughter.

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Highlights of our work

Canada bans shark finning and shark fin trade

Canada, once the largest importer of shark fins outside Asia, passed a landmark bill that included measures to prohibit the trade in shark fins nationally as well as finning in Canadian waters. Humane World for Animals campaigned for the ban for a decade.

Canada enacts historic ban on elephant ivory and rhino horn trade

Following a seven-year campaign by Humane World for Animals Canada, the Canadian government banned domestic trade in elephant ivory and rhino horn, as well as the import of hunting trophies containing these parts. The landmark measures fulfilled a 2021 Ministerial mandate and were a critical step in protecting these iconic species.

Hawaiian spinner dolphin calf in the ocean

Canada bans captivity of whales and dolphins for entertainment

Humane World for Animals Canada worked to help pass The Ending the Captivity of Whales and Dolphins Act or the “Free Willy Bill,” which imposed a sweeping ban on the trade, possession, capture and breeding of all cetaceans for entertainment.

Health Canada announced a strychnine poisoning ban

After years of advocacy and campaigning, Health Canada's Pest Management Regulatory Agency decided to cease the use of the poison strychnine for killing wild animals, including wolves, coyotes and black bears. Strychnine is notorious for causing some of the most agonizing symptoms of any poison, including muscular convulsions that can last up to 24 hours or longer.

Grizzly bear hunting ends in BC

Following a longstanding campaign by animal welfare, conservation and First Nations groups, the Government of British Columbia finally ended the hunting of grizzly bears throughout the province. The decision eliminates loopholes that would have allowed trophy hunting of grizzlies to continue, while respecting the will of the overwhelming majority of BC residents.

British Columbia banned mink fur farming

In the wake of multiple outbreaks of COVID-19 on BC fur farms—and an incident in which infectious mink escaped from a quarantined facility—the provincial government announced a phase-out of mink farming. Mink farming is exceptionally cruel, intensively confining highly intelligent, semi-aquatic wild animals and denying them their most basic of needs.