Strict regulations issued for elephant caretakers

COLOMBO (News 1st): Sri Lanka has banned the for baby elephants to be separated from their mothers in a new extra gazette notification issued by the State Minister of Wildlife Protection, Wimalaweera Dissanayake. According to the extra gazette, all captive elephants will be issued their own biometric identity cards while elephant riders have been banned from drinking on the job. The new measures aims at protecting the animals’ welfare and include strict regulations around logging elephants. Logging elephants have been mandated a daily two-and-a-half-hour bath each, and cannot be worked for more than four hours a day while night work is prohibited. Moreover, no more than four people can ride an elephant at once, and they are required to sit on a well-padded saddle.