IELTS Corner

B.A (Hons) In English Literature  M.A In English Literature  Lecturer, English Department, Rajdhani High School, Sher-e-bangla Nagar, Dhaka - 1207 e-mail: [email protected] List Paragraph; READING PASSAGE-2 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 16-28 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below. Zoo Conservation Programmes One of London Zoo’s recent advertisements caused me some irritation, so patently did it distort reality. Headlined “Without zoos, you might as well tell these animals to get stuffed”, it was bordered with illustrations of several endangered species and went on to extol the myth that without zoos like London Zoo these animals “will almost certainly disappear forever”. With the zoo world’s rather mediocre record on conservation, one might be forgiven for being slightly sceptical about such an advertisement. Zoos were originally created as places of entertainment, and their suggested involvement with conservation didn’t seriously arise until about 30 years ago, when the Zoological Society of London held the first formal international meeting on the subject. Eight years later, a series of world conferences took place, entitled “The Breeding of Endangered Species”, and from this point onwards conservation became the zoo community’s buzzword. This commitment has now been clear defined in The World Zoo Conservation Strategy (WZCS, September 1993), which although an important and welcome document does seem to be based on an unrealistic optimism about the nature of the zoo industry. The WZCS estimates that there are about 10,000 zoos in the world, of which around 1,000 represent a core of quality collections capable of participating in coordinated conservation programmes. This is probably the document’s first failing, as I believe that 10,000 is a serious underestimate of the total number of places masquerading as zoological establishments. Of course, it is difficult to get accurate data but, to put the issue into perspective, I have found that, in a year of working in Eastern Europe, I discover fresh zoos on almost a weekly basis. The second flaw in the reasoning of the WZCS document is the naive faith it places in its 1,000 core zoos. One would assume that the calibre of these institutions would have been carefully examined, but it appears that the criterion for inclusion on this select list might merely be that the zoo is a member of a zoo federation or association. This might be a good starting point, working on the premise that members must meet certain standards, but again the facts don’t support the theory. to be continued..