Letter to Shinagawa Prince Hotel

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Created on Friday, 11 March 2005 17:47

In response to the proposed dolphin show plan, IKAN has submitted a letter to Shinagawa Prince Hotel, and subsequently received a rather paltry answer from the hotel.
IKAN then sent another letter to the hotel in order to enunciate their problems. The letters can be viewed below.(The letter from Shinagawa Prince has been summarized by IKAN)

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We, Dolphin & Whale Action Network, is a no-for-profit NGO working for the coexistence of wildlife and humans.

As the importance of the natural environment has become more acknowledged, and its vital component, the ecology of wildlife, has become better understood, problems associated with captivity of wild animals in artificial confinements have become more apparent. Especially for those animals like dolphins that live in a complex social system and travel great distances in vast ocean, keeping them in an artificial facility poses many problems. Strong criticisms have been raised internationally that some countries have now discontinued captivity of cetaceans. In the midst of such climate, the introduced your hotel's new project "AquaStadium " is very disturbing, and we would like to ask the following questions regarding the welfare of the animals.

1. The species and the number of dolphins to be exhibited.
2. Whether the dolphins were caught in the wild or bred. If the dolphins are wild in origin, where they were captured.
3. Capacity of the holding pool.
4. Sort of water to be used for the pool.
5. Frequency of water quality tests and change.
6. Water circulation system to be used.
7. Chemicals to be used for the pool water.
8. Kind and quantity of feed, and method of feeding
9. Contents of the dolphin shows (number of shows per day, duration of one show and contents of the show)
10. Whether there is a resident veterinarian.
11. Whether the manual on animal captivity written by the Ministry of Environment was used during the planning stage.

From the 1980's to early 1990's, your group has a history of destroying valuable environments for land developments. However, we understand that currently your group is striving to rebuild itself. Upon such a time of change, we strongly ask you to also reconsider the policy of using wildlife for commercial purposes, and move forward as a group well representing the 21st century.

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Answer from Shinagawa prince hotel to the questions of IKAN regarding the dolphin shows at AquaStadium:

Their answer is:
'We will strive to operate by creating a healthy environment for the animals, and also by providing a facility for people to enjoy and learn, and think and exchange ideas about sea creatures and their environment.
The purpose of having sea mammals such as dolphins and showing dolphin performance at the dolphin pool is to let many people know about living things. By showing dolphins and other animal's ecology, and by allowing people from various ages to see directly with their own eyes, we hope that the wonder of living things can be acknowledged, and the understanding can be deepened.
Performances and training are necessary to take care of the animals' health. The routine exercise will also allow us to find any health abnormalities at an early stage.'

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IKAN's Letter 2
This is Your Opportunity- for Honest Answers and Plan Change

Thank you for your prompt reply when you have so much trouble at hand already.
We opened the letter with a new hope that things have changed, but it quickly turned to a disappointment when we read your answers.Our questions were about the necessity of a commercial business like a hotel having and displaying wild dolphins and about your policies on animal welfare.
These questions were unanswered in your letter. In your first paragraph:


The comments here contradicted very much with the terms you used in press releases and other advertisements (ie "entertainment" and "healing place for adults [otonano iyashi]") that they seemed to be out of place. Interests and concerns for animal welfare has risen lately that Japan also made a manual at the Ministry of the Environment, on how to keep display animals. The manual is based on the basic policy that the keeper is to care about the welfare of the animal kept, and the captive environment is to be matched with the ecology of the animal as much as possible.
According to "1. General Policy 2: On the selection of the animals" of the manual:


Similarly, "3. Universal Standard 1: On the method of animal keeping and animal health" states that:


It seems virtually impossible to fulfill this universal standard when keeping large animals at a facility like a hotel where the general purpose of it is different from animal keeping.For example, business hours that last until late evenings would impede the animals rest and sleep, and would not create a best captive environment.
We think that a project like this, which seems only to be falling behind the times, may create a temporary profit but will shortly stall. Life should not be used for a plan like this that lacks future prospects. You stated that your facility would be "for people to enjoy and learn, and think and exchange ideas about sea creatures and their environment," but we are highly doubtful that these would be possible, as there would be no information panels and the visitors would be coming to the facility to eat or to grab a cup of coffee.
It also says in "Animal Keeping Standard 3.1 (3) On the training of animal keepers,"


What specific measures will be taken for the keeping of the animals, when your business is in different business category, and how "learn, think and exchange ideas" be managed? This next paragraph was very strange indeed:


Dolphin shows, as in a monkey riding choo-choos and a bear dancing on a ball, are just cheap performances that would not happen in the natural world. The educational message the show would give to the public is "The powerful human can do whatever we want with weak ones like captive dolphins." This would be counter-effective and a bad education representing that humans have forgotten how to care for others. Even if it was to "let people know about animals widely," it should not be done at objectively different facility like a hotel.


This was an amazingly selfish comment. Why does a hotel even bother to bring dolphins from the wild to take care of their health? For the dolphins that are separated from their families and forced to do tricks for frozen food, isn't this the ultimate "none of your business"?
It was perhaps business as usual to be using wildlife for a group like yours who have been destroying the environment showing no interest in public benefit or welfare. However we were hoping that through the "incident" currently undertaking your group had changed. During the process of renewing your group, the use of animal for money may only seem trivial, but please do not forget that people are now paying attention to your response to these small matters, and how you can be honest and attentive. From what we have heard, Mr. Tsutsumi was very proud about the number of customers Shinagawa Prince Hotel had been attracting. The business is apparently going just fine without sacrificing poor creatures that hoping for more is a plain simple greed.
As one of the steps towards the change from the old ways, we sincerely hope your group reconsiders the AquaStadium plan.

Thank you.