African Safari

The death of the African Safari as some romanticize it to be may have already started with the banning of canned hunting in South Africa this year. Canned hunting is the practice of allowing so called hunters to shoot lions bred in captivity just for the purpose of being hunted by tourists with big wallets. Many consider this to be the ultimate African safari while most of the civilized world looks upon this as nothing more than a disgusting pastime practiced by a few inadequate individuals who have to undertake the experience to satisfy their short comings! The only people worse than these poor individuals are the people who have encouraged this industry in pursuit of generating that all powerful dollar!

The hunting of lions and other big cats bred in captivity purely to be shot is being outlawed in South Africa. That country’s Department of the Environment said the new regulations will make it illegal for anyone to kill large predators raised in an enclosed reserve. Because they were bred in captivity, and have never experienced the wild to develop their survival instincts, these animals are really no match for even the most inexperienced hunter/tourist. The department said it would also ban the shooting of lions, cheetahs and leopards in a ''controlled environment,'' where hunters had an unfair advantage over the beasts, as well as forbidding the killing of tranquilized animals.

Many people all over the World have welcomed these measures and applaud them believing the African safari is now firmly set on the right path of only offering tourists the opportunity to hunt with their cameras. However, two very big problems are not addressed and in fact are created by these new measures.

Firstly, and very much like the problem associated with the banning of the trade in ivory to protect the elephant population one finds that the problem will just move across Africa's long unguarded borders. There are enough African countries that are both poor and very under policed for these practices to just spring up in these poor countries and become even more popular. A good example of this would be a country that borders on South Africa like Zimbabwe. This country has an excellent reputation for being able to offer a world class African safari to its visitors but inflation and poverty are running riot, foreign exchange is almost non-existent and there is not enough qualified people around to stop this form of ‘hunting’ disguised as an African safari becoming a very large money spinner.

Another potential problem that this welcomed move will create is that nobody has suggested what one can be done with the thousands of tame lions that have been bred for the sole purpose of satisfying this one form of African safari. These animals were bred to make money for their owners but what happens to them when they can no longer do this. They can’t fend for themselves, and ‘rehabilitating tame animals to take care of themselves in the wild is a very expensive process.

Every potential visitor contemplating taking an African safari should be made aware of this dark side to this wonderful experience, and then maybe someone could come up with an answer that will solve this problem.