People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and regional animal welfare organisations like Animals Save Sweden and Direct Action Everywhere Stockholm organised activists to appear as enormous ‘ducks’ outside H&M’s annual meeting.

The Karolinska Institutet is the location of the yearly gathering. Along with demonstrators on the ground, PETA has a representative at the annual meeting who is presenting a shareholder resolution regarding animal welfare. The resolution requests that the board of directors of H&M Group put up a report on the slaughter procedures used to get down for the business.

Following a PETA Asia investigation into Vina Prauden, a Vietnamese company that has supplied down to H&M, it was discovered that ducks were being stabbed in the neck while they were still conscious, languishing in filthy sheds and lots covered in faeces, and suffering from gaping, bloody wounds. After workers severed their necks, many of the birds kept moving for more than a minute, according to PETA.

‘H&M is alienating progressive shoppers with its ‘humane washing,’ as every down item represents the pain and suffering of terrified birds,’ says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. ‘PETA is urging H&M to help end this cruelty by banning down and sticking to animal-friendly materials, such as those it already sells and that its shoppers love.’

In order to make claims concerning animal welfare, PETAs resolution has pointed out that H&M relies on the Textile Exchange’s (TE) Responsible Down Standard (RDS), which has been shown to be useless. H&M recently got rid of the RDS designation from its products, showing that it is aware that the RDS is a sham. The business gives no details regarding the farms and slaughterhouses that supply down for its products.