Conservation vs Education vs Entertainment

Andrew, you posted in the American forum some views on education and conservation that you seemed to be applying to American zoos as well as your own in the UK. You cleared up that you were not talking about American zoos, so whatever disagreement we had seems to be moot now. The business model that your zoo runs under obviously is very different from what a comparable zoo in America would likely be run under (i.e, a privately owned zoo vs. a non-profit or publicly owned zoo).

 

Each time you single us out for specific comment, and I am unclear of the motive. The fact is that the 'business model' whatever the definition of that is, of most zoos in most other countries is very different to those in America. I repeat that this does not mean that that any of them produce inferior results, be those commercial, or in education or conservation. Because of the differences I doubt there are many (if any) zoos in the US which are comparable to us or most other UK zoos. I know that there are direct comparisons which could be made in other countries such as France or Australia; but must defer to colleagues such as TB or SL who know the UK and USA very well.