Photo Credit: AP Photo/David Longstreath

July 12, 2010–According to The Washington Post, “Bangkok authorities said Monday anyone caught handing bunches of bananas or sugar cane to the hulking beasts – proffered by their handlers to make money – faces a $320 (10,000 baht) fine.”

The AP article also reported:

Thailand has about 2,400 domestic elephants. There is little demand these days for the animals’ traditional skills in logging and other labor, so owners sometimes loan them out for begging from tourists and locals in major cities.

“The ordinance is issued to prevent untidiness or danger toward properties and lives of Bangkok residents,” said Manit Techa-apichoke, deputy director of the City Law Enforcement Department, adding there had been cases of elephants hurting people and falling into drains.

Friends of the Asian Elephant, a Thai non-government group which cares for injured or mistreated elephants, called the fines a good start.

“I’ve been asking for them to do this for 15 years,” said its founder, Soraida Salwala, adding that she hoped other Thai cities would follow suit. “It’s not the total solution, but it’s a help.”

Previously, mahouts – as elephant handlers are known – and their accomplices were fined for bringing an elephant into Bangkok, but those feeding the animal escaped punishment. Typically a tourist would pay 20 baht ($0.62) for the privilege of handing a bunch of fruit or vegetables into the elephant’s trunk.

Begging street elephants are a huge problem in Thailand and other cities throughout Southeast Asia and India.  Not only do they cause a distraction and get caught in traffic accidents with humans, but city-life is horrendous for these emotional, intelligent, sensitive beings who communicate through seismic vibrations that they feel through their feet, in addition to trumpeting with their vocal cords.

Let us not forget that anyone who feeds an Asian Elephant is actually contributing to the problem of wild-capturing an endangered species (usually while they are babies, because baby elephants earn more on the street), breaking their spirits in order to “domesticate” them, and then selling them into a life of hardship, trauma, abuse and neglect, where they will be passed or sold from owner to owner for the rest of their lives.

Fining the people who feed elephants is a baby step in the right direction to protect Asian Elephants in the long-run. Once there is less demand for feeding street elephants, the owners will have to make a different choices–perhaps looking to sell their elephants to sanctuaries or even asking the Thai government to expand the The Pang-La Nursery Home for Aged Elephant, which it announced in 21 November 2009 but has so far not enforced.

You can read the rest of the Washington Post article here. As we learn more, I will share it here.  Cheers!

-Windy Borman

Director & Producer, The Eyes of Thailand

Where do elephants go to retire?  No, that is not the start of a bad joke, it’s a legitimate question for an endangered species who was captured from the wild, domesticated (usually through brutal methods) and spent its life begging on the street, logging, performing at tourist camps or carrying back-fulls of tourists at trekking camps.

Starting on 21 November 2009, Thailand will send its “retired” elephants to The Pang-La Nursery Home for Aged Elephant, according to the Bangkok Post article published 10 Oct 2009.

I asked Soraida Salwala, founder of Friends of the Asian Elephant (FAE) and the World’s First Elephant Hospital, about her thoughts about a government-run Nursing Home for aging and “retired” elephants.  She wrote:

The Last Home Project (for the unwanted elephants) has been the project of Friends of the Asian Elephant since our inception in 1993. It has also been known widely among the authorities and officials of the Ministry, especially of the FIO, since their staff used to work closely with FAE in the first few years.

FAE could not carry out many projects as we have planned due to lack of funds and obstacles that never cease. However, our Last Home Project has been taken and the name (in Thai: BAAN LUNG SOUD TAIE) is used by the government sector, which I find it quite strange. Even though it is our initiative we are also happy that our many projects are being done by many government and private groups (in and outside Thailand). At the very least, the elephants will have a place to stay, being fed properly and with veterinary care. The only thing that troubles me is “will they be really taken care of properly?” and not being put for show and for other purposes.

How I wish that there are no more elephant politics in Thailand so the elephants management will be for the good of the elephants and those who truly care for them.

For the elephants,

Soraida Salwala

When asked if an Elephant Nursing Home is a good or a bad thing, Soraida wrote:

It is a good thing, it is from FAE’s projects, so how could it not be good! But I am concerned as to the hidden agendas. Government sectors are not supposed to receive donation money for their own gain, but they (FIO) do even though they receive over 100 million Baht Budget a year.

To read more about Thailand’s plan for an Elephant Nursing Home, please visit The Bangkok Post.

To learn more about The Eyes of Thailand documentary, which features Soraida Salwala and FAE, please visit the film’s webpage.

-Windy Borman

Producer, Writer and Director, The Eyes of Thailand