Elephants hit by monetary crisis

Elephants hit by monetary crisis

JAKARTA (JP): After being caught in the wilderness, locked up
and then "educated", elephants in the famed Lhok Asan training
center are now having to bear the brunt of the monetary crisis.

Over the past six months, the 49 beasts in Lhok Asan have had
their health care expenses cut because medicine prices have
soared as much as 300 percent, a forestry official said.

"Before the economic crisis, each elephant needed Rp 12,000
(US$1.26) in health care a day but now the cost has skyrocketed
to Rp 36,000," Bambang Suprayogi, chairman of the Aceh
conservation office, told Antara yesterday.

The health-care costs include the procurement of vitamins and
antibiotics for the 21 wild elephants and 28 trainer and hunter
elephants.

In addition to the medical expenses, the training center
spends Rp 343,000 a day feeding the animals that are protected by
law and may not be killed even though they often run rampage in
residential and agricultural areas.

Bambang said the government's inability to meet the mammoth
health-care budget had left the elephants exposed to infection
and the deadly tympany.

The economic crisis has prompted the provincial government to
stop catching and taming wild elephants, especially because
tranquilizer prices have doubled to Rp 3 million per box.

The move is raising fears the population of wild elephants in
western and southern Aceh and Pidie regencies will soon start to
soar. (pan)