By December 1, 2028, shows of lions, tigers and all wild animals will be banned in traveling circuses. In the meantime, from Friday, circus performers can no longer acquire them or reproduce them.
Published
Reading time: 2 min
:quality(50)/2023/12/01/000-9ry2ty-656a01b020172103088830.jpg)
“Sarabi, Faraï and Nala, they are lionesses born here”, details Solovich Dumas, the director of the Circus of Rome, while distributing caresses and sweet words to them. From Friday December 1st, these births of lion cubs will no longer take place. The reproduction and acquisition of these animals are now prohibited in circuses. This is one of the stages of the ban on the keeping and performances of wild animals in traveling circuses by December 1, 2028 and provided for by a law of November 30, 2021.
Ultimately, lions, tigers, and other wild animals will have to be placed in shelters. An entire economy and know-how are threatened with disappearance, warn the professionals concerned and opposed to this regulation. This is therefore the case of Solovich Dumas, of the Cirque de Rome owned by the same family since 1857 and who set up his big top in Bondy in the Paris region: “We don’t want to sterilize our animals. For me, it’s like mutilating them. A sterilized animal, in terms of morphology, it’s no longer the same animal at all. It doesn’t have its cycles, it gets bigger . Everything plays on the metabolism of the animal”.
The one who is also spokesperson for the Association for the Defense of Family Circuses, representing around forty companies, says he is ready to be sanctioned. “If we have to pay a fine because we made an animal reproduce, well, it doesn’t matter, he specifies. On the other hand, the zoo, the refuge, the sanctuary will breed animals galore because they have the right. If we prohibit on one side, we must prohibit on the other.”
“We will go to the end to defend our activity”
Solovich Dumas, director of the Circus of Romeat franceinfo
“Some of us are determined. They are even ready to release the animals into the wild, and the state will kill them. You want to bother us but we will bother you too“, he assures. For Chelsea, 15 years old, on the track since she was little, it’s a forced reconversion. “The problem is that we can’t do another job. It’s that or nothing. People stopped the circus with the animals and they went under”she says.
For Muriel Arnal, president of One Voice, the aberration is continuing on the same model. His animal rights association regularly attacks circus companies. She believes that the government’s action is too slow and too weak.
“There is no political will regarding these animals”
Muriel Arnal, president of One Voiceat franceinfo
“The animals must stop reproducing. They must be taken care of. The authorities do not have the means. It is a text which is disappointing, which is a sham and which, what’s more, has not yet been accompanied by either a decree or an order by the Ministry of Ecology.indicates Muriel Arnal.
For its part, the State Secretariat for Biodiversity confirms that only an implementing decree on sanctions will be signed by the end of the year and that there will also be checks carried out in circuses.