Captive Wild Animals

Wild animals may be kept by people as pets or for exhibition and performance in zoos. In a report to the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission earlier this year (2021) we questioned the suitability of exotic (non native, wild) animals to be kept in homes and highlighted various legal and policy options that governments could consider to mitigate against the risks associated with the trade in exotics, including zoonotic disease and species decline, as well as animals being kept in wholly unsuitable conditions that do not meet their welfare needs.

We also published a report about the ownership of primates as pets which we used as the basis of our consultation response to Defra. We will continue to monitor developments in this area.