Campaigns

Below is a list of the campaigns being carried out in Aotearoa by various groups for the animals. These are campaigns with regular demonstrations and actions that you can get involved in.

There are many Animal Rights groups in Aotearoa working on many different aspects of animal abuse and some of these do not have regular campaigns as their work might be legal or media based for example. There really is something for everyone. For a list of all Animal Rights groups in Aotearoa visit the Aotearoa Animal Rights Directory.

Farm Tours

Farm tours are organised by Animal Liberation Aoteaeroa. The aim is to show people the reality of factory farming first hand, to document and explain the plight of animals of the farms visited and how people felt about the experience.

For more information about Farm Tours click here.

To get involved email admin@animalliberationaotearoa.org.nz

Foie Gras

The foie gras campaign targets stores selling foie gras and campaigns agaisnt them until they remove it from their store; Much like the Fur Free Auckland campaign.

Foir gras is the diseased and fattened liver of ducks and geese, who have been intentionally force feed vast amounts of grain to deliberately cause their liver to swell to ten times their natural size. The ducks or geese are typically kept in large windowless sheds and suffer extreme pain during and after the force feeding process. After just a few weeks of force feeding the birds are in constant agony, unable to breathe properly and suffering from constant diarrhea. The birds are then slaughtered cruelly soon before they would die from sickness and disease.

There are several restaurants and delis selling this disgusting product around Auckland.

For more information about the Aucland Animal Rights Collective click here.

To contact the Auckland Animal Rights Collective and get involved in Foie Gras email them on animalrightscollective@gmail.com

Fur Free Auckland

The Fur Free Auckland campaign was started in 2000 by Auckland Animal Action. It targets stores and designers using/selling fur and encourages them to stop for the animals. The stores and designers are given information about the fur industry and are asked to go fur free; if this fails demonstrations are held at the stores until they stop selling fur. Over 70 stores in Auckland have stopped selling fur permanently.

Since Auckland Animal Action dissolved at the beginning of 2008 this campaign has been continued by Auckland Animal Rights Collective.

For more information about the Aucland Animal Rights Collective click here.

To contact the Auckland Animal Rights Collective and get involved in Fur Free Auckland email them on animalrightscollective@gmail.com

Save the Valley Animal Research Centre Beagles

Valley Animal Research Centre (VARC) has been quietly expanding its operations and now has extensive facilities in the Hawke's Bay and Manawatu regions.

Headed by Canadian toxicologist Dr Alan Goldenthal, a former director of Pasteur Merioux's Animal Resources and Pathology Centre in Canada and research director of Massey University-owned Estendart Ltd in Palmerston North, VARC is a contract facility that provides animal experimentation services to national and international clients.

There is a campaign to shut down VARC and save these beagles. There are three different groups working on this campaign:

SAFE
They can be contacted at safe@safe.org.nz
They also have a specific website set up for the VARC beagles, click here to visit it.

Save the Beagles
Save the Beagles is a grassroots collective of animal rights activist from Wellington and Auckland. They can be contacted on nzarinfo@gmail.com
They also have a website, click here to visit it.

Local Manawatu Group
There is also a local person from the Manawatu who wants to start a local campaign to help the beagles. If you live in the area and are interested in getting involved he can be contacted on freebeagles@gmail.com

Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty

Huntingdon Live Sciences (HLS) is the largest contact animal testing company in Europe. There is an international campaign to close them down; this is called Stop Huntington Animal Cruelty (SHAC). The campaign targets HLS customers and services providers as well as HLS themselves.

There are HLS customers in Aotearoa and as part of this international effort to close HLS Animal Rights Activists from Aotearoa are organising a campaign against them.

For more information about the New Zealand campaign to close HLS click here.

To contact those involved in Aotearoa email stophls@yahoo.com

McVegan

McVegan started in the America however Hamilton Animal Rights Activists have bought it to Aotearoa. McVegan is a protest against the promotion of junk food, the unethical targeting of children, exploitation of workers, animal cruelty, damage to the environment and the global domination of corporations over our lives. McDonalds is the worlds single largest user of beef, much of which is raised on former tropical rainforest land. It aims to raise awareness of McDonald's (and other unethical food giants) negative impact on the environment (including deforestation, genetic engineering, resource depletion, and waste effluent), human health, animal rights, workers' rights, sweat shops, world hunger, Third World debt, and globalisation.

The Hamilton Animal Rights Groups are only just forming; their details will be added as they come to light.