It is high time the Minister of Natural Resources and Environment take a real hard look at the more than thirty over animal establishments in the country be they zoos, mini-zoos, aviaries, bird parks, crocodile farms which exist in almost every state in Malaysia.

The Housing and Local Government minister, too, should adopt a similar approach as some state zoos fall under his management.

Both these ministries need to see the real zoo situation for themselves instead of focusing on just one major problematic and mismanaged zoo. Before thinking of transforming the National Zoo into a ‘world class zoo’, priorities should be placed on the many such establishments where conditions within most are rarely satisfactory.

SAM has received a number of complaints from visitors regarding the incarceration of wildlife in small cages, dirty exhibits and bored, listless and lethargic animals. Understandably, many of our zoos are only for people, not for the animals.

Some zoos spend thousands of ringgit building unsuitable enclosures and acquire exotic animals which are expensive to maintain.

Obviously, there is a lack of expert planning and in the management of zoos plus a total lack of understanding of the particular needs of the animals in a zoo. Often, animals end up suffering and dying. Keeping wildlife captive in zoos only fosters the emergence of abnormal behavioural patterns.

In zoos, animals have become a mere spectacle and have been reduced to commercial commodities. In the case of petting zoos, animals are kept in small corralled areas where curious kids harass them. There are many examples of these situations where humans come into close ‘hands-on’ contact with animals kept specifically for human-animal interaction.

The handling and feeding of these animals by visitors are seldom supervised or controlled. The animals are not chosen for their suitability for handling and many are subjected to suffering, distress or excessive disturbance. This is sheer cruelty.

There is an occurring incident where a tiger is forced to sit and have its photograph taken and this goes on late into the night. It’s often beaten to ensure it obeys commands causing extreme stress to the animal.

Currently, guidelines for zoos are merely administrative with no legal force and only cases of cruelty are dealt with under the Wildlife Protection Act. For an industry which is mushrooming, it is up to the government to act now. With no law ensuring minimum standards for zoos, the animals in the majority of these zoos are for nothing more than profit or entertainment.

Zoos should be held responsible and accountable for the animals under their care. Consequently, setting minimum enforcement standards for all zoos in the name of animal welfare ought to be enshrined in the national legislation.

A new zoo policy, which while not intending to abolish zoos as an institution, should aim to abolish those which are badly run or fail to fulfill basic animal welfare requirements.

A zoo policy should ensure, among others:

- a tighter enforcement of the Zoo Licencing Act;

- doing away with ‘Special Permits’ enabling zoos to acquire animals in the Cites I category;

- setting up an official advisory panel on captive animal welfare,

- setting suitable welfare standards for zoo animals;

- the feasibility of making all zoos pay for guaranteed closure fund which would underwrite operational care costs in the event of a zoo closing.

Serious consideration ought to be taken to fit zoos into a stricter legal framework. Proper respect for animals requires the adoption of compulsory minimum standards for the welfare of all captive animals. Surely there is more to treating animals in an appropriate way than keeping them alive.

The writer is president, Sahabat Alam Malaysia.