From captive pandas in zoos, online shopping for “exotic pets” to new oceanariums, reflecting on the evolution of civilization| Dr. Zhou Jinfeng Talks about Ecological Civilization (Lecture 137)
2021/12/31 10:03:00 本站

From captive pandas in zoos, online shopping for “exotic pets” to new oceanariums, reflecting on the evolution of civilization| Dr. Zhou Jinfeng Talks about Ecological Civilization (Lecture 137)

 

Humankind has experienced primitive civilization, agricultural civilization and industrial civilization, and the ecological civilization we want to realize today is the inevitable trend of historical development. What exactly is ecological civilization? Why should we realize it? Dr. Zhou Jinfeng from China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (CBCGDF) has something to say.

Zhou Jinfeng pointed out that biodiversity is the root of ecological civilization. To give a simple example: decades ago, animal protection experts from the United States and China worked together on the conservation of giant pandas, overcoming the technical problems of artificial breeding of giant pandas and finding the method of artificial domestication of giant pandas, and now hundreds of zoos around the world have Chinese giant pandas on display. This has been promoted as "a very successful case of functional biological conservation". But we think these ideas and claims are industrialized, including the popular online shopping of “exotic pets”. Many people buy exotic animals around the world online to keep such as different snakes, frogs and turtles, which is also a product of industrial civilization. The whole industry is growing very fast. In fact, giant pandas are placed in zoos as a collective "exotic pet". All of this has catalyzed the loss of global biodiversity.

Now the world's leading zoos, both at home and abroad, are not emphasizing such exotic animals, but local species, and they are ready to return the zoo's original elephants to the African grasslands, and close the entire zoo one after another.

Xiong'an New Area in Hebei Province, north China was once going to build an oceanarium, which is also a product of industrial civilization. Industrial civilization has many flags and methods. Taking science and technology for example, it is fundamentally economically driven. The tourism economy and sightseeing economy are essentially the same. In 2019, a large case of spotted seal poaching was uncovered in Dalian, where 100 spotted seal pups, still nursing, were illegally stolen from their mothers by poachers, resulting in a large number of deaths. Why was the poaching? It’s found later by police after investigation that it was driven by the market demand of the oceanarium, and most of these spotted seal pups had been booked in advance by the oceanarium.

Oceanariums have now become one of the most important drivers of biodiversity loss and illegal wildlife trade. “No more oceanariums should be built. This is the change of civilization, and the fundamental change that civilization needs.” Zhou Jinfeng suggested.

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Original Chinese Article: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/cAxJ3Jf8S4E3vyF7clq1gQ 

Translator/Samantha

Contribution

https://www.paypal.me/CBCGDFChina 

http://www.cbcgdf.org/English/ConfirmDonaTion/0.html