Hard on the heels of the announcement that Guangzhou's Grandview Mall is planning to expand their wildlife exhibit comes an offer from a UK zoo to relocate the mall’s ever-depressed polar bear, according to Animals Asia.
Dubbed the “world’s saddest polar bear” by numerous media outlets and animal rights groups, the animal, named Pizza, made headlines back in June when video footage surfaced showing the bear living in appalling conditions.
The video stirred calls for a boycott of the facility and led to the creation of an online petition demanding the aquarium's closure. The petition, created by Animals Asia, currently has over half a million signatures.
The offer to relocate Pizza was tabled by the Yorkshire Wildlife Park, which runs a polar bear sanctuary – arguably a much better place for the animal than its current prison cell-esque enclosure.
The Yorkshire Wildlife Park’s polar bear facility – a major step-up from Grandview’s Ocean World.
As we previously reported, polar bears are known to have home ranges that can extend for thousands of square kilometers. One example is an Alaskan polar bear that’s home range was discovered to be 45 times the size of Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which covers an area of 2,114 square kilometers – much bigger than Pizza’s current habitat.
"The good news now for Grandview is that they now have the chance to put their mistake right," Animals Asia’s Animal Welfare Director Dave Neale said in a statement.
"Thanks to this incredible offer from Yorkshire Wildlife Park there can be a happy ending and the negative publicity they have suffered can yet be turned into a positive news story.”
Admittedly, no one can make Ocean World forfeit the bear. And with the facility planning a massive expansion to house tigers and pandas (among other creatures), it's unclear if they'll be willing to relocate Pizza.
[Images via Animals Asia, Daily Mail]
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