Every year South Africa attracts thousands of volunteers who pay for a certain experience and to help out an organisation or cause – but it seems that the cracks are starting to show in these dealings. The latest findings have to do with foreign ecotourism volunteers who pay up to R21 000 to help ‘conservation projects’ for around two weeks. One of the most popular choices is to work with lion cubs who are “orphaned” and are being “raised to be reintroduced into the wild”.
However, this is not actually the case.
The cubs are being raised to be killed.
An estimated 6,000 lions are held in captivity in South Africa at present in around 200 farms and breeding facilities, compared to 2,500 roaming free in reserves and parks.
Among them are a large number of cubs taken from their mothers not long after birth and put into “petting zoos” where they are visited by thousands of tourists each year who pay up to R650 for half-hour interactions.
Once they become too old to be safe for human interaction, lions from some facilities are either sold to Asia for their pelts and use in lion bone wine, which is growing in popularity, or sent to private farms where they are shot by hunters.
And, not surprisingly, Cecil the Lion was one of these.
Breeding farms and private reserves raise the cubs until they are too old – but when volunteers found out what was really going on they were distraught.
In one place there were 26 or 27 cubs in one enclosure. The volunteers started asking how it was possible they were all orphaned and where they went when they reached adulthood. Others noticed strangers coming to the breeding facilities to point out the lions they wanted which would then just disappear.
Most would find the staff and owners were short with them when they asked too many questions, or would laugh at them, but some encountered real hostility and one was threatened with being sued for damage to business and slander.
Many conservation parks came out with strong and staunch defences of their links to hunting. The well-known Lion Park just outside Johannesburg said their operations had nothing to do with hunting and the work they and their 250/year volunteers assisted in considerable educational and conservation value. All their animals are micro-chipped and retire either into the park’s own reserve or carefully vetted private reserves or zoos. Not sure if that’s any better.
Kelly Marnewick, manager for the Endangered Wildlife Trust’s carnivore conservation programme, warned of lion petting reserves that accepted volunteers.
Genuine breeding for release is not done in a big commercial set up with volunteers, petting zoos and Facebook profiles. There is no need to hand raise lion cubs for conservation. There are bad and less bad places where lions are held in captivity but those really wanting to work in conservation should go to where the animals are in the wild.”
This might be a large pill to swallow, but South African’s need to start holding reserves like this responsible for their actions and start speaking up about the ill treatment of animals (and people, too).
*Can I also just say that if reserves are so ready to offer up hunting experiences to foreigners, shouldn’t we be fighting the social media awareness war by pointing out and name-shaming the reserves rather than the silly igits who pay for it. Let’s go to the source, man!
[source: telegraph]
