Victor Watkins

Victor Watkins has worked in the field of international animal welfare for the past 30 years undertaking investigations into a variety of issues including the farming of bears for their bile, the trade in dogs for human consumption, bullfighting, fur farming, and the illegal traffic in wildlife.

In 1991 he set up the world’s first international campaign to protect bears from cruelty in the wild and in captivity. This campaign, called Libearty, was run by the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) for whom Victor is a Wildlife Advisor.

Over the past two decades Victor has worked with animal groups around the world to highlight the exploitation of bears and to gain public and government support to end cruel practices such as dancing bears in Europe and Asia, bear farming in Asia, bear-baiting in Pakistan and the use of captive bears for public entertainment.

Victor initiated the concept of the bear sanctuary in 1992 to enable the Greek and Turkish governments to eradicate the use of dancing bears in their countries. All the dancing bears were confiscated and placed in purpose-built forest sanctuaries in those countries.

Since then bear sanctuaries have been built in countries such as Bulgaria, Thailand, Pakistan, China, Vietnam and North America to allow for the rescue of bears from illegal or poor captive conditions. The most recent bear sanctuary is in central Romania and is known as the Libearty bear sanctuary. At the time of publication of his book – Bear Sanctuary - it was caring for 56 rescued bears.

Victor has been involved in the making of a number of TV documentaries on wildlife protection, the latest being a series of programmes featuring the Romanian bear sanctuary on the Animal Planet TV channel.

Victor hopes that this book will encourage a wider appreciation of the need to protect bears from exploitation. He hopes that more governments and organisations will try to protect these magnificent wild animals in their natural habitats. For further information about the Romanian bear sanctuary and others around the world, see Victor’s web site at: www.bearsanctuary.com