It is an extremely rare occasion when good news on conservation comes out of China. With so many economic and social woes to concentrate on, the central Government has little time or energy to devote to the issues that richer nations worry about.
So Jill Robinson's achievement in persuading the authorities to phase out bear farming over 15 years is a breakthrough of heroic proportions. She deserves high praise for her tenacity and courage. But in recognising the feat of one animal rights activist, it must not be forgotten that an equal partner in her success story is the mainland Government, which has turned its back on a thriving industry in the name of animal welfare. That is no small concession. Many areas where the farms are located have more than their fair share of unemployment problems and rural deprivation.
But part of the reason for Ms Robinson's success is that she knows the difficulties these regions face, and that people, too, suffer badly when times are hard. Her Animals Asia Foundation and the International Fund for Animal Welfare that she first worked for take a positive approach. They look for ways to compensate farmers for financial loss and try to help them find a better means of livelihood.
The horrors of bear farming - graphically explained in our feature story - are too brutal to need repeating. When animals were as plentiful as the human race and man had to hunt on foot, nature could retain a balance while the parts used in traditional medicine came from slain animals. Now, virtually every species on Earth is under threat.
As knowledge advances and traditional Chinese medicine keeps pace, some herbs have been identified as having the same therapeutic value as bear bile. More and more practitioners of Chinese medicine are also trying to raise ethical standards and replace animal parts with herbal substitutes.
This is where the final onus rests. Campaigners like Jill Robinson can only do so much. Unless herbal doctors revise their prescriptions, there will soon be no animals left to pound into remedies; so it is in their own interest to change their ways and educate their patients. Happily, the awareness that the bear parks are bringing is a sign that mainlanders are becoming more receptive to conservation and environmental issues. That should lead to a more humane society and a better quality of life for all.
