Conservation versus welfare

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BAN THE ivory trade. Ban the fur trade. Ban the seal culling. Are we talking

conservation or animal welfare? Is there a difference, and does it matter

anyway? Yes there is, and yes it does, says David Jones, director of London

Zoo. He believes that the public is being misled by a barrage of animal

welfare appeals, disguised as conservation campaigns.

 

Jones is a vet, so he knows about animal welfare. He is also a trustee of

the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and chairman of the Flora and Fauna

Preservation Society (FFPS), so he knows about conservation. London Zoo, as

part of the Zoological Society of London, works with both animal welfare and

conservation groups.

 

The source of confusion, he says, is the growing number of animal welfare

groups leaping onto the conservation bandwagon. In today's enlightened

world, the very word 'conservation' lends weight to any animal cause, and is

easily hijacked. 'Serious conservation groups would not call themselves

animal welfare organisations, whereas welfare groups do call themselves

conservation groups and have a rather muddled view of conservation.'

 

This, warns Jones, is one of the biggest threats to mainstream conservation

organisations, such as WWF and FFPS. Their 'sensible priorities' and

long-term plans could be undermined by high-profile, but ill-considered and

short-term animal welfare projects. 'Take groups such as Elefriends, the

International Fund for Animal Welfare and Lynx: all these are trying to call

themselves conservation groups. The problem is that most of them have little

understanding of what real conservation needs are.'

 

The animal welfarists, he claims, have a 'hands-off' approach to protecting

wildlife, with their campaigns often focused on a single group of animals.

In essence their message is: 'We hate humans doing anything to elephants or

seals or whatever.' They are appealing to public sympathy for funds to help

them prevent any more of these animals being killed. This, he says, 'is a

very attractive message to the population at large, because 90 per cent of

them think this is what conservation is all about'.

 

But conservation, in Jones's view, is a question of managing natural

resources for the mutual benefit of humans and wildlife. While wildlife

products may play a vital part in local economies, animals and people may be

competing for food and space. The hands-off approach to wildlife ignores

basic human needs, he says: 'There are the questions of human relations with

wildlife resources; the need to be self-supporting, whole issues of human

development in the Third World.'

 

Conservation is not going to happen at all unless local governments and

local attitudes change, he says, and that won't happen if foreign protesters

secure a ban on the very products which form the traditional basis of

lifestyle and economy. 'We are talking about resources for poor people. Yes,

there is a welfare problem in the trapping of wild animals, but it is

separate to the conservation issue.'

 

Jones believes that the WWF and similar organisations must take the

initiative to explain to the public that conservation means more than

pinning 'Do not touch' signs on wildlife. If they don't, the animal

welfarists will imprint their own misleading definition of conservation on

the public.

 

The animal welfare groups are indignant at Jones's accusations. 'That's

monumental hypocrisy,' says Stefan Ormrod, scientific director of Lynx.

'Bosh!' replies Ian MacPhail, European Animal Welfare Consultant for the

International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW). What sort of conservation

message does the public get from zoos, anyway, they ask? According to

Ormrod, Lynx doesn't consider itself as either a conservation or an animal

welfare organisation: 'Our main thrust is animal rights.' Lynx's aim is to

ban trade in all furs, be they from endangered species or not. Conservation

is not the motive, but Ormrod accepts it can be a consequence of their

action: 'Our target is the consumer. If we can make the product

unacceptable, it is a better way of protecting the animal in the long term.'

 

 

Ormrod is sceptical of Jones's philosophy of conservation, which revolves

around the sustainable use of wildlife resources, with wildlife having to

pay its way. It doesn't work, he says - at least, not for the fur trade. In

reality, if an animal has value in the marketplace, it will be exploited. As

long as the market remains, the exploitation will continue, leading

eventually to illegal trade in what becomes a new endangered species.

 

Besides, he adds, it is all too convenient to use the traditional lifestyles

of, say, the Inuit people as a reason to endorse hunting and trapping. But

most Inuit now live surrounded by the colour TVs and videos of 20th-century

lifestyles. They are no longer dependent on trapping for food and clothing;

they are merely additional suppliers to the international market.

 

MacPhail agrees that conservation and animal welfare are separate issues,

but says they can, and do, overlap. IFAW was founded to fight for the end of

inhumane practices in seal culling in Canada - a campaign which MacPhail

says was never billed as a conservation issue; it was pure anti-cruelty.

With that battle now won, IFAW has turned to other issues. Some encompass

conservation. Lobbying to ban the practice in the Philippines of trussing up

live dogs, destined for dinner tables, has nothing to do with conservation.

Successfully lobbying in Britain to ban lead from fishing weights because

the lead was poisoning swans was both a conservation and a welfare issue.

IFAW explains the reasons for individual campaigns to its members in

newsletters.

 

Elefriends' director, Will Travers, refutes the charge that his campaign to

protect the African elephant is short term and ill considered. Set up last

year to lobby for an all-out ban on ivory trade at the CITES conference in

Lausanne, Elefriends has since developed into what Travers describes as a

'one-stop shop' for elephant protection. Based in the UK, the group provides

information, support for conservation and raises public awareness.

 

Travers does not distinguish between animal welfare and conservation. 'You

can't judge conservation success and failure only by statistics,' he says.

He cites the Daphne Sheldrick elephant orphanage in Kenya, where young

elephants, whose parents have been gunned down by poachers, are raised. An

expensive way to keep a few elephants alive, says Travers, but in terms of

the public involvement and popular interest it generates, it is a valuable

introduction to the wider issues of poaching and conservation.

 

Travers says there will always be different views about conservation

priorities. Talking about the one species that concerns him most, he says:

'We may not all agree about how we are going about it, but we must surely

all agree that the end result should be saving the elephants.'

 

The same conclusion must surely apply to all species whose futures lie in

the hands of conservationists and welfarists.

 

Debbie Macklin is a freelance journalist and researcher who specialises in

life sciences and the environment.

From issue 1733 of New Scientist magazine, 08 September 1990, page

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