New Exhibits vs In Situ Conservation Funding

A closer analysis of CCZ annual accounts reveals that, for two of the nine societies, grant income from external sources equated to 79.8% and 65.6% of their conservation expenditure in 2019. One spent only 56% of its allocated conservation budget in 2019. With over two-thirds of the money being spent on in situ conservation originating from external grants, the role of zoos and their contribution to conservation from the housing of so many species in captivity is questionable. The direct funding of in situ conservation programmes by granting bodies would be a more efficient way of ensuring they can meet their objectives. Jeweller Tiffany & Co. announced in April 2021 that they had donated over £7 million to the Wildlife Conservation Network through its ‘Save the Wild Collection.’45 Since the jewellery collection was released, this equates to the equivalent of approximately £1.75 million for in situ conservation funding per annum. This figure exceeds eight of the nine CCZ members’ financial contributions to in situ conservation and does not involve the display of wild animals in captivity in order to generate the money. With zoos contributing so little (as low as 4.2%) of their generated income to in situ conservation, and their animal collections consisting primarily of non-threatened species (73.4%), their importance to in situ conservation would appear to be overstated.4

Zoos should also make it clear to the visiting public what proportion of their admission fees and other expenditure is used for authentic conservation purposes. The proportion spent on in situ conservation by CCZ zoos appears to have changed little since Born Free previously examined this issue in 2007, equating to between £1.26 - £1.39 per average adult entrance ticket, with one CCZ member contributing as little as £0.07 per admission. It is interesting to note that when purchasing a ticket to one of these zoos online, typically two types of standard adult ticket are offered: one with a donation and one without. Ten of the 13 zoos either display the ticket with donation as the first option or have the option of donating pre-selected (such donations are also eligible for an additional 25% of taxpayer’s money in Gift Aid, which is not included in this report’s calculations). Language underneath states that a voluntary donation helps to, “support our conservation efforts,” or similar.46 Such language is used by eight of the 13 zoos, albeit it does not specify what proportion of the donation will be used to support in situ conservation directly. As the typical donation added some 10% to the ticket price, and this study found approximately 6.6% of gate charges went to in situ conservation, it would suggest that at least part of this donation is staying within the zoo, presumably to help fund new exhibits and other such infrastructure.

New Exhibits vs In Situ Conservation Funding

On its website, BIAZA states that its members contribute approximately £24 million to over 800 field conservation projects annually.47 As of the start of 2020, BIAZA reported having 117 members within its association.48 Therefore, the field conservation contribution of BIAZA members equates to, on average, approximately £205,000 per member, or just £30,000 per project. Given that some CCZ members, all of which are members of BIAZA, contributed considerably more than this figure, it would suggest some BIAZA members are making, at best, very limited financial contributions to field conservation projects.

At a global level, Gusset and Dick estimated in 2008 that zoos contributed approximately $350 million (£252 million) to “wildlife conservation”. 49 However, the authors’ definition of zoo spending on “wildlife conservation” included spending on both in situ conservation and ex situ work without further explanation of what this entailed. Therefore, the direct financial contribution to in situ conservation is likely much less. Despite this, the figure is still commonly used by zoos today in their attempts to justify their conservation credentials.40 Out of context, this may appear to be a substantial sum. However, if one considers that there are estimated to be over 10,000 zoos globally, this equates to just over £25k per zoo per annum.50 Even if we assume that the best 10% of zoos, those that are members of zoo associations, are the primary contributors, this equates to just £250k per zoo per annum. We strongly suspect that while some zoos may contribute significantly more, many zoos contribute little or nothing.

To contextualise these figures, it is interesting to compare conservation expenditure with the recent expenditure by CCZ members on new exhibits within their institutions. Arguably the most notable recent new exhibit among CCZ members is Chester Zoo’s Islands. Dubbed the “largest zoo development project in the history of British Zoos,” it reportedly cost approximately £40 million.51 In 2015, the same year that this exhibit opened, Chester Zoo spent £1.5 million on in situ conservation.52 In other words, the exhibit cost more than 26 years’ worth of Chester’s in situ conservation expenditure, and almost double the contribution of all 117 BIAZA members to in situ conservation in a year. Likewise, it equated to 16% of what the worldwide zoo industry claims to spend on “wildlife conservation” per annum.49

Several other CCZ members have also spent vast sums of money which could, if redirected, have provided vital support for in situ conservation. In 2021, Edinburgh Zoo announced that it had spent £2.8 million on a new giraffe exhibit, almost double what they had reportedly spent on conservation and research in 2019 (including over £1 million in external grants).53 Other examples include the £1.5 million new tiger enclosure at Twycross, Welsh Mountain Zoo’s £1 million snow leopard enclosure, London Zoo’s £3.6 million Tiger Territory and Bristol Zoo’s Wild Place Project, which included the Bear Wood exhibit at a cost of £5 million (which represents over seven times Bristol Zoological Society’s contribution to conservation and research in 2019, including external grants).54-57 As previously mentioned, Dudley Zoo and Castle stated in September 2020 that they had been forced to use, ‘all the cash reserves…set aside for development work to survive,’ yet in April 2021 it was reported that work had started on a new £500,000 orangutan enclosure.28,58 When compared to the figures spent on new exhibits, the in situ conservation funding contributions of CCZ members looks very small. The sad truth is that not only is this money perpetuating the unnecessary captive housing of species with no clear conservation purpose, but it is also being diverted away from in situ conservation where it could provide significant benefits to wildlife and the protection of wider ecosystems and the thousands of species they support.

CCZ member Edinburgh Zoo’s new giraffe facility cost £2.8m to house five giraffe. This huge sum would fund Born Free’s giraffe conservation in Kenya for over ten years, benefitting thousands of giraffes.

CCZ member Welsh Mountain Zoo, the Welsh National Zoo, has just spent £1m on a new snow leopard facility, which houses two snow leopards.

CZ member London Zoo’s Tiger Territory cost £3.6m, houses just two tigers and is available to hire for evening social events. This sum would fund Born Free’s tiger conservation in India for 36 years, where wild tigers are now on the up.