Truth is better than fiction
- By Richard Branson -
- Oct 08, 2012
The truth is often so much better than fiction. Journalists from The Sun and The Daily Mail would do well to learn that when writing about our lemur conservation program on Necker.
I received a letter today from Christoph Schwitzer, the lemur expert that they quoted in stories today. He said that he "had neither spoken to The Sun, the Mail nor to any media about the lemurs, other than in a very positive way," and that he was 100% supportive of what we are trying to do in setting up a breeding program for the lemurs.
Christoph has been incredibly helpful in giving us guidance and help in how to best conduct our program, which we are extremely grateful for.
We've put the lemurs in very large enclosures so that there is enough space for them to act naturally, keep fit and therefore breed so we can build their population numbers back up.
What we are doing has been approved by all the main conservation organisations that specialise in lemur protection. A private zoo in London liked what we were doing and has given us their lemurs to give them more space and a better chance of breeding.
Although they put chips in all the lemurs that were to be shipped to us, somehow three of the lemurs chips couldn't be discovered on first reading when leaving the country and those lemurs are stuck in quarantine in the UK. Hopefully they will be reunited with their families in the next few days, in time for the breeding season.
Wouldn't it be be nice if journalists could check their facts before writing misleading stories - and in the Mail's case copying misleading stories!
By Richard Branson. Founder of Virgin Group
