Every year, the global leather industry slaughters more than a billion animals. Most of the leather in the U.S. and Europe comes from India, China, and other countries that either have no animal welfare laws or have laws that go largely or completely unenforced. The animals are grotesquely abused in ways that shock the conscience of all kind people.

As India's own animal protection laws are blatantly ignored, unsanitary slaughterhouses continue to pollute the environment; unlicensed, illegal slaughterhouses remain in operation; and the widespread abuse of animals persists. In direct violation of the Constitution of India are marched for days without food or water. Those who collapse from exhaustion have their eyes smeared with chili peppers and tobacco and their tails broken in an effort to keep them moving. Crammed into extremely crowded illegal transport trucks for the long journey to slaughter, many are trampled or gored during the ride.

Because India's animal transport and slaughter laws are not enforced, many of the animals used for leather are so sick and injured by the time they arrive at the slaughterhouse that they must be dragged inside. Once inside, their throats are cut open--often with dirty, blunt knives--on floors that are covered with feces, blood, guts, and urine. Some animals are skinned and dismembered while they are still conscious.

Raising animals whose skins are eventually made into leather creates waste and pollution and consumes huge amounts of fossil fuels. Most leather around the world is tanned using chromium and other hazardous waste. Among the disastrous consequences of using this noxious waste is the threat to human health from the highly elevated levels of lead, cyanide, and formaldehyde in the groundwater near tanneries.

Most of the millions of animals slaughtered for their skin endure the horrors of factory farming before being shipped to slaughter. Buying leather directly contributes to factory farms and slaughterhouses since skin is the most economically important byproduct of the meat-packing industry. Leather shares all the environmental destruction of the meat industry, in addition to the toxins used in tanning.

Here is the link to an important video on the Indian leather trade.  I think most viewers will forget who the narrator is after a few minutes.
http://getactive.peta.org/campaign/US_indian_leather?sour ... ...

For more information see Bruce Friedrich's "Leather: Dead Skin, Environmental Nightmare" on Common Dreams:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/30/863/