Hundreds of elephant centres in Thailand are facing closure after the coronavirus decimated the country's tourism industry.<br /><br />The sanctuaries and zoos are popular with holidaymakers but since the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus, visitors to the country have plunged.<br /><br />According to official figures, there was a 40 per cent drop in tourists between January 25 and February 29, with March expected to be even worse.<br /><br />In Chiang Mai, where there are 93 elephant camps of varying size, officials said that 85 of them were facing closure unless the situation improved.<br /><br />Boontha Chailert, president of the Chiang Mai Tourism Business Association and the Maetaeng Elephant Park, said they had already cut staff and would need to make further savings.<br /><br />He said the worst case scenario would see the camp close permanently, with the elephants having to be re-homed.<br /><br />''It's a similar situation across the country,'' he said. ''We cannot survive without tourism and the elephants can't be cared for without that income.''<br /><br />Footage from Monday (March 9) morning shows the mahouts at the normally busy Maetaeng Elephant Park walking around the empty property.<br /><br />While a handful of tourists all wearing masks sat on a stand, many fed up staff could only play on their phones to stay entertained.<br /><br />Their working hours have already been reduced in response to the drop in revenue caused by the contagious outbreak. <br /><br />Boontha added: "Normally there would be more than a thousand tourists visiting this centre each day, but recently there have only been around 50.<br /><br />"We need around 500 tourists a day to break even and cover the running costs. It costs about four million THB (97,469 GBP) per month to pay 500 employees and raise100 elephants.<br /><br />"We have to cut the costs by reducing the mahouts working days down to 15 days but soon we will soon have to cut them to 10 days.<br /><br />"If nothing improves over the next couple of months we will have to shut down the centre as well. That is the worst case scenario because of the coronavirus.''<br /><br />In Thailand there have been 53 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and one death. Around the world, there have been at least 114,614 cases and 4,030 deaths as of March 10.
