- Following the collapse of tourism due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many of Thailand’s 2,700 captive elephants used for tourism trekked back to rural villages alongside their keepers, where it was hoped they could forage naturally.
- Two years later, international visitors are beginning to return to the country and a new tourism model is emerging in locations where community-managed forests are available to the elephants.
- Under the new model, elephants are granted access to community forests, where they can forage and explore their natural behaviors. Meanwhile, tourists keen to learn about elephants in a natural setting are beginning to visit, enabling people in the villages to generate income.
- Adam Oswell, a photographer who has been documenting wildlife trade and protection in Asia for more than 20 years, spoke with Mongabay recently about his work documenting these projects and the fate…
Q&A with photographer Adam Oswell
