- Ridiyagama Safari Park is an enabler, Biodiversity Conservation and Research Circle claims
Poaching and wildlife trafficking constitute one of the biggest illegal businesses worldwide, with a total worth between $ 7-23 billion per year, according to a 2014 United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report. As a biodiversity hotspot with a wealth of endemic species, poaching has always been a major issue in Sri Lanka.
In conversation with Brunch, Biodiversity Conservation and Research Circle Convener Supun Lahiru Prakash revealed they had received information that the animals kept for the observation of the visitors at Ridiyagama Safari Park, Hambantota, as well as the wild animals coming from the adjoining forest area, are being slaughtered for bushmeat in various ways by an organised smuggling racket of zoo workers.
In Sri Lanka, the 1937 Fauna and Flora Protection Ordinance (FFPO) is the primary legislation that protects wild animals, including mammals and reptiles. Most animals are protected under the FFPO, and several species that are near-threatened, vulnerable, endangered, or critically endangered are classified as strictly protected. This gives way for poachers of protected animals to be arrested without a warrant but bailed out, while hunters of strictly protected animals are not bailable at all.
However, as Prakash noted, there are several constraints to the effective implementation of the ordinance and other relevant laws. “According to various sources, the Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWC) as the responsible agency has gaps in manpower, training, monitoring capacities, and funding to curb poaching and wildlife trafficking everywhere on the island,” he told us.
Going back to the issue at hand, we learned that the animals that are being slaughtered in this way are being sent for consumption to various hotels and powerful people in the area, allowing a few of the zoo employees of Ridiyagama Safari Park to earn some extra money. Prakash stated that it is unfortunate that until now, the authorities of the Department of National Zoological Gardens or Ridiyagama Safari Park have failed to take any action against this illegal racket.
“Anyone who visits the park is likely to see a sambar deer in the World Herbivore Zone of the park with a noose in its antler nowadays, from a recent incident,” he described sadly, informing us that by some stroke of luck, the noose was caught on the antler of the animal, and the said animal was not harmed. “If by some chance the noose had caught around the neck of the animal, it is very likely that it would have become another victim of the meat smuggling operation carried out by the zoo workers in Ridiyagama Safari Park.”
Several attempts to contact the officials at Ridiyagama Safari Park for a comment on the matter proved futile.
Prakash went on to say that, according to their understanding, there must be a direct or indirect relationship between the poachers and the Ridiyagama Safari Park staff, as they observed that there is very limited scope for outsiders to come and lay nooses in an enclosed area like a zoo.
“On the other hand, the park authorities should not be allowing this to continue if it is being done by outsiders,” he stressed, emphasising that even if the animals that stumble outside the parks boundaries are being subjected to such, it is still unacceptable.
In many areas around Sri Lanka’s national parks, Prakash explained that tourism had recently replaced poaching as a major source of livelihoods and transformed the rural economy. “So instead of hunting and selling wildlife, second- or third-generation hunters now drive safari jeeps, vans, tuk-tuks, or boats, and work as tour guides or staff at guest houses,” he told us. However, he added, tourism has unfortunately been at a standstill after the pandemic and now the economic crisis and unstable situation in the country, so these people have turned once again to illegal poaching to make money.
Prakash informed us that their organisation has made an official request for the relevant authorities to prioritise this matter, conduct an immediate investigation, and take the necessary measures to prevent these inhumane and illegal acts of animal cruelty and dish out severe punishment to the culprits, regardless of their position.
