KARACHI: The zoo and the Safari Park in Karachi and the Singapore Zoo have agreed to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU), sources told Dawn.

The MoU that would be signed in coming weeks, the sources said, aimed at bringing improvement in the Karachi zoo and the Safari Park as per international standards.

They also said that the Karachi Metropolitan Cor-poration (KMC) had planned to send the director zoo, the senior director of culture, sports and recreation (CSR) and the director of administration accounts of the KMC to Singapore to sign the agreement.

Some quarters, the sources pointed out, were criticising the composition of the team on grounds that it didn’t include any technical staff. No prior approval for the visit, they said, had been taken from the zoo advisory committee headed by the commissioner.

Upon contact, director of the CSR of the KMC Raza Abbas Rizvi, who is part of the team going to Singapore, confirmed that a three-member KMC delegation would be sent to Singapore as soon as funds were available from the Sindh government.

“The MoU would help in purchase and exchange of animals as well as in providing technical training to staff in Karachi,” Mr Rizvi said, adding that the visit had been approved by the zoo advisory committee. The visit, he said, was part of efforts to improve facilities for captive animals and make them a member of the World Association for Zoos and Aquariums.

“We are also encouraging industries, the business community and non-governmental organisations to support and fund the zoo/Safari,” he added. The head of the zoo advisory committee and its members, however, denied that any approval for the Singapore visit had been taken. “The KMC has arran-ged the visit on its own. The advisory committee will ask for inclusion of technical staff in the team, though,” commissioner of Karachi Shoaib Ahmed Siddiqui said.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2015

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