A Marine Life Park (MLP) whereby more than 100,000 living exhibits of marine life will is slated to start operations in 2012, at Resorts World Sentosa (RWS). The aim of this MLP, as cited by RWS, is to ‘enrich public understanding of marine conservation’. It also wishes to serve as a public showcase for education and research of marine wildlife. The MLP houses 25 indo-pacific bottlenose dolphins as well. There will also be a whale shark exhibit at the MLP. However, before the opening of the MLP, there have already been issues and concerns being raised by the public and some animal welfare organizations, with regards to the captivity of these dolphins and the whale sharks.

As animal captivity has been a controversial issue over the past years, an issue that undoubtedly concerns the public and animal welfare organizations (such as SPCA and ACRES) is that RWS seems to only be bringing these dolphins for amusement to the public, henceforth generating more profits when RWS’s dolphin shows become popular. The question is – is RWS doing anything about the public’s comments towards its actions? Is RWS really excessively importing these bottlenose dolphins for the money or for the greater good of its species?

Another issue that the public has with RWS housing the whale shark exhibit is that whale sharks, which are being held in captivity, have low survival rates due to various reasons, such as limited captive space, stress from being unaccustomed to captive life and so on.

Surprisingly, after SPCA, ACRES and other NGOs launched a “Say No to Whale Sharks in Captivity” campaign in response to the whale shark exhibit at the MLP, RWS announced to the press that it would not proceed with the exhibit, for the sole purpose of conservation of this species. On one hand, it would seem dubious to the public that RWS had actually decided to cancel the exhibit only after the