Fur traders to flock to Kastoria for fair

Visitors from Ukraine and Russia, as well as from China and Korea, will be among the 64 traders and business owners from around the world attending the 47th Kastoria International Fur Fair, which gets underway on Thursday.

The fair is “returning to normalcy” following the coronavirus pandemic is attracting strong interest despite the negative economic climate globally, Apostolos Tsoukas, president of the Kastoria Fur Producers Association, said.

The four-day event will host new designs of professionals and fashion school graduates from West Macedonia.

“We want to provide an opportunity for young people of our region to promote their creations, and we promised this will become an annual event for fairs to be held in the future,” Tsoukas said.

Kastoria is the heartland of a centuries-old fur industry in Greece, Europe’s last remaining fur manufacturing center and one of the few EU countries still allowing fur farming despite pressure from animal rights groups at home and abroad. [AMNA, Reuters]