Sealskin is the skin of a seal. Phoca (pusa) hispida (Ringed seal) fur skin

Seal skins have been used by aboriginal people for millennia to make waterproof jackets and boots, and seal fur to make

fur coats Fur clothing is clothing made from the preserved skins of mammals. Fur is one of the oldest forms of clothing, and is thought to have been widely used by people for at least 120,000 years. The term 'fur' is often used to refer to a specific i ...

. Sailors used to have

tobacco pouch A tobacco pouch is a pouch used to hold tobacco. They are often made out of leather, and once were made of sealskin. Rolling and pipe tobacco is often sold in a plastic pouch. The person who purchases the tobacco, if they own a tobacco pouch, will ...

es made from sealskin. Canada, Greenland, Norway, Russia and Namibia all export sealskin. It was traditionally used to make Scottish

sporran The sporran (; Scottish Gaelic and Irish for " purse"), a traditional part of male Scottish Highland dress, is a pouch that performs the same function as pockets on the pocketless kilt. Made of leather or fur, the ornamentation of the sporran is ...

s. The Inuit, a group of people indigenous to North America, argue that banning both seal products and

seal hunting Seal hunting, or sealing, is the personal or commercial hunting of seals. Seal hunting is currently practiced in ten countries: United States (above the Arctic Circle in Alaska), Canada, Namibia, Denmark (in self-governing Greenland only), Ice ...

is detrimental to their way of life and the

Inuit culture The Inuit are an indigenous people of the Arctic and subarctic regions of North America (parts of Alaska, Canada, and Greenland). The ancestors of the present-day Inuit are culturally related to Iñupiat (northern Alaska), and Yupik (Siberia and ...

. However, many non-Inuit object to the use of seal skin, fur and pelts, and it is illegal to hunt seals in many countries, particularly young seals. The value of global sealskin exports in 2006 was over CA$16 million. Pinseal is the term for sealskin leather.

References

{{leather Hides (skin) Pinnipeds Seal hunting