Month: February 2016

From the 9^th to the 13^th of March ITB (Internationale Tourismus – Bȍrse Berlin) will be celebrating 50 years of being the leading travel and tourism trade show worldwide.

The response from the Global Community to the practice of breeding lions, as well as the mis-management of wild lions – purely for the entertainment of the tourism community – over the last year has been astounding. Who would have thought that a single lion, Cecil, and a documentary such as BLOOD LIONS™ could have brought upon such a rapid and engaged response? It is for this reason that ITB – a major international tourism trade fair in Berlin, Germany – asked for the ground-breaking film BLOOD LIONS™ to be shown, as well as for panel discussions and a workshop to take place to figure out how tourism and travel activities can play a part in ensuring the exploitation of predators is no longer an acceptable practice.

BLOOD LIONS™ will be available at ITB on Stand 242 in Hall 4.1.  The producer, Pippa Hankinson, will be screening the film as well as participating in a number of key events:  

• Together with Dr. Simon Morgan, Director of Wildlife ACT, Pippa has been invited to present the keynote address at Fair Trade Tourism’s annual event on the Main Stage in Hall 4.1 on Thursday 10^th March at 10h15. They will also be participating in the subsequent panel discussion entitled “Imagine Helping Africa”, where issues regarding the quality in the volunteering sector, as well as how this might impact on the image and brands of the continent will be examined.
• The full documentary BLOOD LIONS™ will then be screened inRoom Regensburg (adjacent to Hall 4.1), on Thursday 10th March at 14h45.
• The screening will be immediately followed by a Workshop in Room Regensburg at 16h15 exploring “Predator Interactive Voluntourism”. BLOOD LIONS™, Wildlife ACT, Fair Trade Tourism and Global Nature Fund will form part of the panel discussion. This valuable debate will include questions such as whether these interactions support ethical and sustainable. The role of predator sanctuaries will be looked at, together with the criteria for identifying bona fide conservation projects. The link to “canned” or captive hunting and the “tiger bone trade” will also be examined.
• On Friday 11th March at 14h00 at Pow-Wow in Hall 4.1, there will be a 30 minute presentation on “Predator Interactions – are tourists and volunteers being conned?” where the trailer and some short clips from the film BLOOD LIONS™ will be shown. This will be followed by a short interactive Q&A with BLOOD LIONS™ producer Pippa Hankinson and Wildlife ACT director Dr. Simon Morgan, around whether tourists and volunteers are being misled.

BLOOD LIONS™ is a feature documentary that exposes the captive lion breeding and canned hunting industry in South Africa. Approximately 1,000 captive-bred, hand-reared lions were killed in the country last year, fuelling a multimillion-dollar international industry.

It is estimated that there are currently between 6,000 and 8,000 predators in captivity, mostly living in appalling conditions with inadequate breeding and welfare protocols in place to protect them. Volunteers believe they are supporting bona fide conservation projects and that the cubs will one day be rewilded. However, lion ecologists state that captive breeding plays no role in the conservation of this species, and that to date no captive bred, hand-reared lions have successfully been rehabilitated into the wild.

“There is still a lot of work to be done though and unfortunately the abuse of the “Voluntourism” dollar is still high, with lion cub petting and lion walking still being promoted heavily in Southern Africa,” said Dr. Simon Morgan of Wildlife ACT. “Wildlife ACT and Fair Trade Tourism brought the message about this abuse during the World Youth Travel Conference in Cape Town, by hosting a screening of BLOOD LIONS™ with a follow-up workshop with the conference delegates and producers of the film. It was at this conference in Cape Town that some organisers of ITB realised the importance of bringing this message to the global travel industry and kindly offered the BLOOD LIONS™ team, in partnership with Wildlife ACT and Fair Trade Tourism, the opportunity to bring the same message to unsuspecting supporters of this abhorrent practice of breeding lions to be bottle-fed, petted, cuddled, taken for walks and then ultimately hunted for profit.

In this chain of exploitation it is the tourism dollar earned from the “voluntourism” market and the add-on lion walks that are really cashing in on these poor animals which are bred simply for the bullet. Although the wild lion population of Africa is in decline, it is important to note that the captive breeding of lion play no role in the conservation of this species, in any way, and this is scientific fact. There are therefore no facilities which breed lion that can claim to contribute to the conservation of this species in any meaningful way. The global travel industry has a role to play in bringing these practices to an abrupt end and we will explore these issues while at ITB.”

Given that in Africa wild lions are in catastrophic decline–the latest International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) figures suggest that fewer than 20 000 remain – it may come as a shock to discover that as many as 10 000 of the continent’s iconic big cats were legally hunted and exported as trophies in the ten years ending in 2013.

The vast majority of these lions were bred in captivity for the purpose of hunting. The mostly American and European sports hunters took the lions to their home countries as trophies–mounted heads or skins for their collections.

The tally for hunted lions is likely even higher than 10 000, says Dereck Joubert, wildlife filmmaker and National Geographic explorer-in-residence, because not all hunters take trophies. Some hunt just for the sport.

WATCH: Conservation couple holds southern African name high on The Ellen DeGeneres Show

Six African countries where lions still range freely–South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Namibia and Tanzania–were analysed using the official CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) trade database, which lists animal and plant products exported and imported internationally.

Kenya and Botswana are two lion-range countries notably omitted from this list. Both countries have outlawed trophy hunting in an effort to boost lion populations, although Botswana only recently adopted this measure.

Even though the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species lists lions as Vulnerable (facing a high risk of extinction in the wild), African range lions in all six countries are listed by CITES under Appendix II, which means lion products may be exported under a permit system. Permits are granted “if the relevant authorities are satisfied that certain conditions are met, above all that trade will not be detrimental to the survival of the species in the wild.”

South Africa Tops List

Of the six nations, South Africa ranks highest in terms of most trophies exported. The country has registered a staggering average of 748 lion trophies exported per year.

Tanzania is next with an annual average of almost 150 lion trophies, followed by Zimbabwe and Zambia (each between 60-70 a year), Mozambique (22) and Namibia less than 20 a year). Botswana, before banning trophy hunting in January 2014, tabled an average of 10 trophies each year.

The figures are not 100 percent accurate as there are a number of discrepancies that creep into the database, such as countries reporting the number of permits issued but not the actual permits used. However, the figures give a general idea of just how impactful trophy hunting is on lions.

Country Exported Trophies 2003-2013 Estimated Wild Lion Population[1] Estimated Captive Lion Population

Despite growing public opposition to canned lion hunting, the lucrative industry remains legal in South Africa

A RECENT high court challenge concerning a disturbing docuentary against canned lion hunting, Blood Lions, served to focus public attention on this distasteful practice.

The documentary added another dimension to the international public outcry which greeted news of the trophy killing of Cecil, the GPS-collared lion in Zimbabwe last July.

Producer of the documentary Philippa Hankinson, who made the film in con- junction with the KZN Wildlands Conservation Trust, said in court papers that the documentary, which premiered in Durban in July last year and was thereafter shown at a number of international venues, had had a “profound effect”.

According to her, members of the Environmental Portfolio Committee in South Africa had “applauded” the documentary, in which a former minister of Tourism, Derek Hanekom, decries the practice of breeding captive lions and “all that goes with it”.

“He comments that the practice has damaged the brand South Africa and that it should be banned,” said Hankinson.

In response to a screening of the documentary, the French government announced an immediate ban on the importation of lion body parts into that country. Australia had already done so in March last year before the release of Blood Lions.

One may wonder then why captive lion breeding and canned hunting remain legal in South Africa. The answer, as with so many dubious activities, is money.

The wealthy lion-breeding industry has proved in the past to be a formidable force. The powerful SA Predator Breeders’ Association in 2010 took on the Ministry of Environmental Affairs in a case about trophy hunting of captive lions and won.

The Supreme Court of Appeals ruled in its favour that the decision taken by the then minister that captive-bred lions had to fend for themselves in an “extensive wildlife system” for two years before they could be hunted was “not rational”.

The reason for this was evidence to the effect that it was difficult, if not impossible, for captive lions to be returned to the wild.

And so this multimillion-rand industry continues, despite mounting opposition and revulsion among the public.

In her affidavit, Hankinson said she was motivated to produce the documentary after being “deeply disturbed” on a visit to a private lion-breeding farm four years ago to find about 80 lions “in small enclosures, many visibly inbred and clearly stressed”.

She then discovered that there are between 6 000 to 8 000 lions living in similar conditions on other breeding farms in South Africa. The majority are sold in South Africa for canned hunting or to Asia to supplement the tiger bone trade. Around 800 lions are shot in South Africa by wealthy hunters in a year.

Ninety-eight percent of all lions hunted in South Africa are captive bred, because on average less than 10 permits are issued annually for “wild” lion hunts.

Last year, 1 090 lion carcasses were exported from South Africa to Asia.

“What was most shocking of all was not only that the industry was legal, but how few people seemed to know anything about it,” said Hankinson.

Ignorance is a major factor, which plays into the hands of these unscrupulous breeders.

Several websites detail practices whereby unsuspecting tourists and members of the South African public support breeding centres that are disguised as legitimate sanctuaries where they have a chance to interact with lion cubs. What the visitors are not told is that the cubs have been cruelly torn from their mothers when they are merely days old so that the lioness becomes fertile again more quickly.

If questioned, common excuses for the separation are that the lioness had no milk or abandoned her cubs.

International volunteers who pay a small fortune to “work with wildlife” in South Africa also contribute to the cap- tive breeding/canned hunting industry ( many unwittingly) due to their desire to work with predator cubs.

Legitimate sanctuaries, it is said, seldom offer experiences with lion cubs.

In November last year, the Professional Hunters Association of SA was quoted in the media and social media distancing itself from the “immoral” practice of canned lion hunting unless or until lion breeders can prove the conservation value of the practice. Conservation activists say breeding lions does not conserve the species as captive-bred lions can’t be released in the wild.

It is to be hoped that this all this might just herald the beginning of a new dawn for South Africa’s lions.

Cape Town – Dedicated wildlife conservationists and National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence Dereck and Beverly Joubert were recently hosted by TV host Ellen DeGeneres to discuss their fascinating documentary, Soul of the Elephant.

The southern African couple from Botswana gave audiences around the globe chills as they spoke about ivory poaching, and how severely it affects elephants.

Beverly described a particular encounter with elephants, where they collected ivory of an elephant carcass. “We put it in the back of our vehicle [and drove away], but we couldn’t make it back to the nearest ranger station, so we had to sleep out in the middle of the bush.

“At about midnight, all of a sudden our vehicle was rocking from side to side. We woke up and we realised that it was an elephant bull. He was rocking us, so Dereck clapped his hands and off the bull went…

“About an hour later, the bull was back again, just rocking the car.

“That’s when we realised they could smell that ivory. We threw it out, and he [the elephant] just picked it up, and fondled it…

“In the morning when we woke up, they had taken the ivory away.”

For the documentary Dereck says they “wanted to get into the very soul of the elephant” and says working with elephants is a meditative experience.

The Jouberts have made 25 films for National Geographic, according to Wildlife Films. They’ve published 11 books, half a dozen scientific papers, and have written many articles for the National Geographic Magazine.

Beverly Joubert is also an acclaimed photographer and her international exhibitions have further helped to raise awareness for the plight of big cats across the world.

In 2011, the couple was honored with the Presidential Order of Meritorious Service by the President of Botswana for their work within the country. The President said “Theirs is a life long passion; for each other, for big cats, for Africa… they are true children of Africa”.

The Jouberts 2011 film, “The Last Lions,” was filmed in Botswana and has since become a powerful ambassador for wild lions globally, reaching over 350 million people and collecting an array of international awards in the process.

After The Ellen DeGeneres Show interview, Dereck tweeted saying “loved the experience”, but was happy to leave before the Hollywood actor Hugh Jackman made his appearance.