Four PAWS SA calls on government to end intense breeding of lions

The Director of Four PAWS in South Africa, Fiona Miles, is calling on government to end the intense breeding of lions in the country. The animal welfare organisation is one of the stakeholders that hosted a panel of experts during a dialogue with the IFP in Parliament last night, to discuss environmental issues.

Miles says the focus of the dialogue was to talk about the captive breeding of big cats and biodiversity and conservation in South Africa.

She says, “There are two types of lions in South Africa. One is wild lions and there are approximately 3000 wild lions left in the wild spaces. And South Africa intensively breeds big cats. Lions, leopards, tigers and other big cats for commercial purposes and commercial purposes include things like tourism activities like cuddling lion cups, working with lions all the way through trophy hunting of elements harvesting of the bones for the international commercial trade in lion bone.”

“We estimate about more than 12 000 lions in these captive intense lion facilities across South Africa. There are more than 25 facilities and we are calling on government to see an end to the intensive breeding and commercial trade of the cats for their parts and derivatives,” adds Miles.

Meanwhile, IFP leader Velenkosini Hlabisa says the dialogue with the experts was critical.

“As politicians are not specialised in all fields that play a key role in the life of our society, the preservation of nature is key to life. Without nature, human beings cannot sustain their lives. Today’s presentation was dealing more with the preservation of wild animals as well as nature. And for the longest time, the IFP has been the champion in dealing with the preservation of wild animals, especially the species that in most cases are found in South Africa or in Africa because these species promote the foreign people as well as the tourists to come and visit South Africa, to come and see this species which helps in terms of tourism and injecting money in our country.”

Hlabisa also touched on rhino poaching.

“The issue of Rhino poaching is a critical issue in South Africa because South Africa was the preserver of White Rhinos in the Hluhluwe Mfolozi Park for the whole world. People traveled across the world to come and see the white rhinos and eventually South Africa because of the provider of the White Rhinos to other countries as well. So now the preservation of the wild animal species, especially those which are rare to be found in other countries, it is of importance for our generations to know them and they also play a greater role as I have said, in terms of tourism which helps a lot in terms of creating job opportunities for our country.”