Thailand captures 73 of 2,500 planned monkeys in Lopburi

Lopburi captures 73 monkeys out of the 2,500 planned to clear the streets

Lopburi, a city in central Thailand, has coexisted for at least a decade with a macaque colony that has taken over streets, squares, monuments and commercial areas. The latest official count indicates about 3,000 specimens roaming unchecked. The local government has presented a plan to capture around 2,500 and confine them in large closed enclosures. This figure is not rounded: it is the declared goal by Athapol Charoenshunsa, Director-General of the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation.

Patience ran out in March when a woman injured her knee after a monkey pulled her feet to steal food, and another man was knocked off a motorcycle by a hungry primate. Far from being peaceful, the animals harass pedestrians and snatch their belongings. Public outrage grew until it forced intervention.

Goal: 2,500 captured monkeys and a May offensive

Between May 23 and 28, an offensive was launched to capture 300 monkeys and sterilize them. The annual target is to trap 2,000 and cage them away from the urban center. As of the available data, only 73 had been captured. The difference between the plan and execution is, to put it mildly, notable.

The standoff between authorities and primates has a cultural layer that complicates any solution. Macaques are a local symbol and a tourist attraction. In Lopburi, there is a giant golden monkey statue at the train station, and the animals gather at a Buddhist temple where monks cut fresh fruit for them, hundreds of kilos. Nearby, a ruined temple serves as the gangs' headquarters. Visitors are handed a bamboo stick for defense because, in groups, they attack and you can only hit them or end up bitten.

From veneration to the baton: the monkey tourism business

The account of a traveler who visited Lopburi twenty years ago describes the scene without adornment: you arrive with good intentions, the attendant gives you the ticket and the stick, you ask what it is for, and he replies to beat them. An hour later, you are swatting monkeys off you with blows. Across the street, Buddhists feed them the best fresh fruit in golden temples, like deities. The contradiction is the heart of the problem: venerated and beaten on the same sidewalk.

The tourism that has exploited the exotic image for years is the same one now demanding a solution. Some argue that the only way out is pure extermination; others point to mass sterilization as the lesser evil; and some note that the conflict is a consequence of urban management itself. A circulating analysis suggests that previously the animals ate from dumps and landfills, and since waste began being burned in incinerators, they trinc the food chain to humans: if they are not fed, they demand food from those who produce it.

What can be learned from this case for other cities

Comparison with other latitudes appears immediately. In some Central Asian countries, according to a resident's account, stray dog management was resolved with a simple protocol: someone called the authorities, the authorities arrived, shot with rifles, removed the bodies. All quickly. In Europe, the debate shifts to pigeons and urban fauna roaming squares and parks without anyone assuming the cost of managing them.

The Lopburi case is an involuntary experiment in coexistence between a species protected by culture and a population that no longer tolerates it. The question is not whether the monkeys will leave, but how many years and budgets will be needed for the capture plan to stop being a headline and become a walkable street. Or does anyone believe that 73 captures are the beginning of something?