Canada's ambassador for fisheries conservation says it could take the European Union as long as two years to pass an import ban on seal products — time that the Canadian government will use to lobby against the legislation.

The EU is proposing to ban seal products from countries that practise what it deems to be inhumane seal hunting, causing unnecessary pain to the animals.

In Canada, Inuit hunters in Nunavut and sealers in Newfoundland and Labrador have insisted that seal hunts are humane, sustainable and an important source of income.

"Canada has the right to defend the legitimate interests of people that are earning a living out there, against misinformation and things that are being spread by NGOs that are absolutely not true and, in many cases, totally misrepresents the hunt as it occurs in Canada," Ambassador Loyola Sullivan told CBC News.

While the ban proposes an exemption for products from traditional Inuit seal hunters, sealers in Nunavut and elsewhere in Canada are worried that the ban will bring down the seal product market altogether.

Sullivan said the proposed ban must go before the 785 members of the European Parliament, as well as before a council of 27 member states that make up the European Union.

Both bodies must agree on the wording of the legislation, along with any amendments, before it can become law.

"A normal process would take a co-decision up to a year and a half, maybe over two years before it would come into law," said Sullivan.

Canada will continue to lobby against the proposed ban while the voting process unfolds, he said.