Dying for a Dollar: Animal Issues in Asia by Philip Sen

It's a familiar story. The elephants on the Bangkok begging circuit. The sorry-looking bears that dance on the streets for Indian rupees or are kept in pits for Japanese Yen. The big cats in tiny cages at some of China's public parks. But, though many travellers naturally walk away from these kind of 'attractions', when animals meet tourism there's a host of less-than-obvious problems. How can you avoid becoming an unwitting collaborator in a culture of cruelty?

Welfare groups not only bemoan the practises that lead to animal exploitation but are also concerned about the lack of awareness. "The exoticism of Asia lends itself to foreign tourists' expectation of seeing wildlife," says Annaliese Smillie of the Animals Asia Foundation, "regardless of whether the animal is in its natural habitat or not. Outside of their own countries and caught up in a holiday spirit, most tourists don't stop to think about the ethics."

Whether or not this is true, as often as not ill treatment of animals simply isn't as blatant as travellers expect. It takes many forms, some subtler than others. Take for example the souvenir industry. That butterfly in a paperweight looks innocent enough, right? Think again. "The trade in animal parts in Asia is immense," asserts Animals Asia chief Jill Robinson, "with many government officials turning a blind eye and allowing traders to exploit species with cruelty in abundance." By rights the knick-knacks you see on sale should probably be attached to a living, breathing creature. The same goes for Guangzhou's (Canton's) exotic meat trade. You could well be chomping on bits of a creature snatched from the wild; at worst you might even be contravening the UN's Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), an offence that may carry a heavy fine.

The best advice is simply not to buy such products or patronize the markets where they are sold, but where does it stop? Surely it's OK to have your photo taken with those tame fruit bats and monkeys in Bali? Cuddling one of these for the camera hardly seems like a crime. Wrong again.

"Baby animals are 'cute' and easy to handle," says Tamara Emir of the Singapore-based Animals Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES). "But these babies will probably have been taken from the wild after their mother has been killed." Emir goes on to state that 'photo animals' at tourist hotspots are frequently drugged and maimed - tiger cubs for example may have had their teeth and claws pulled out - and that once they become too big to handle they are simply killed and replaced.

Even by taking a ride on an animal you may lend justification to appalling practices that go on behind closed doors. At the Elephant Nature Park in Thailand, a sanctuary for abused animals, staff screen a National Geographic video depicting the 'pajan'. It's a common ritual whereby young elephants destined for nearby Chiang Mai's trekking camps are placed in a crush cage and beaten, jabbed with spears and branded with hot metal in order to make them docile enough for the tourist trade. Even animals like horses that seem naturally inclined to interact with humans could well be suffering in silence. "They may be overworked in high temperatures, offered little shade and deprived of food and water to avoid them excreting," says Jill Robinson.

The animal rights blacklist goes on and on. Robinson claims that hardly any Asian zoos and animal parks at all have educational value. "The training of animals in these facilities is almost always with 'negative reinforcement'" she says. "Beating, whipping, punching and bullying the animals into submission until they perform a trick 'right'". So agrees Tamara Emir. "It is likely that the only way to get an animal to perform an unnatural trick is through fear."

Umbrella organisation the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) helps train and co-ordinate 450 animal welfare societies worldwide. It has drawn up a set of guidelines for both travellers and travel companies but in general it advises people not to pay to see animal attractions in the region.

A key problem is the lack of enforced regulations. "No good zoo puts on a show," says WSPA wildlife director Victor Watkins, "but all of them are billed as 'entertaining' and the industry has developed over the last decade to be adept at persuading tourists that the animals are enjoying it too. Our investigations show the contrary." He suggests that anyone sceptical about this should "watch with different eyes" for a while and instances of cruelty will swiftly become obvious. Watkins even names names of attractions in Asia that are not only exploiting animals but seem to be bringing in large quantities of endangered species from the wild. "It's a very profitable industry, and it's impossible to see how it can be regulated," he admits.

So what's the answer? According to ACRES, "if the demand for all these activities was not there, the animals would not be put in these situations." The culture barrier, however, towers high. The mainly Western-based, organised and funded animal rights groups have a lexicon of their own: all animal deaths are 'murder', all conditions are 'barbaric'. On the other hand, many traders see themselves as just making a living and many tourists feel they are just having innocent fun. It's not hard to imagine the looks of incomprehension when faced with what some people might feel are the animal activists' gross overreactions. Some might even regard it as a trendy kind of 'cultural imperialism'.

But it is also important to avoid the trap of tolerating forms of cruelty and exploitation that are unacceptable anywhere in the world. "There are locally-run NGO groups in Asia," asserts Victor Watkins, "so it isn't just a case of Westerners telling local people what to do." Organisations are springing up around the region and are beginning to make inroads: in China, for example, an NGO has successfully pushed for stricter regulations at a safari park where big cats are forced to participate in a gladiatorial 'coliseum'.

All the animal societies we contacted said that concerned tourists can best help improve the situation simply by staying away from attractions that exploit animals. And of course this has to be down to travellers' discretion. Increasing numbers of travel companies are adopting ethical policies too: campaigners say that more will follow suit if pressurised by their customers. But whether by reducing the demand for animal exploitation itself or by sending subtler signals to the industry as a whole, the surest way to effect rapid change is for holidaymakers to steer clear.