Mink farming for fur causes severe welfare suffering in species completely unsuited to intensive captivity.
Mink farming represents one of the most clear-cut welfare cases in animal agriculture. Mink are highly specialised, semi-aquatic predators: their entire sensory and motivational system is oriented toward patrolling, hunting, and swimming. Battery cages deny every natural behaviour simultaneously. The resulting welfare profile — extreme stereotypy rates, self-mutilation, immune suppression, reproductive failure — documents massive, unrelenting suffering. The commercial case for mink farming has collapsed in most Western markets, making welfare-based regulatory bans both morally necessary and economically achievable.