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On my recent visit to Grand Cayman I stopped by what is locally known as the Turtle Farm. That's where I came across this crazy couple who were grabbing baby turtles in a way that takes turtle appreciation to a whole new level. They were actually pretty funny, but what wasn't funny was the fact that this tourist stop for cruise ships is an actual working turtle farm... In other words, a place where they grow turtles and then sell them like a farmer sells cows, to be slaughtered and eaten. Now some official info from Wikipedia Cayman Turtle Farm is a conservation facility and tourist attraction located in the West Bay district of the Cayman Islands. It is used for raising the endangered Green Sea Turtle. Established in 1968 by a group of American and British investors as "Mariculture Limited", the farm was initially a facility used to raise the Green Sea Turtle for commercial purposes. By raising the turtle in a farming operation, the investors could raise turtle-meat for consumption without depleting the wild population of the species. Still in operation as a farm that breeds and raises turtles in order to sell product, the Cayman Turtle Farm has also become a research center and tourist attraction. Currently, the farm is a conservation project as well as the largest land-based attraction in the Cayman Islands. The turtle farm welcomes more than 500,000 visitors annually. Recently, the Cayman Turtle Farm has come under attack from animal welfare and conservation groups who claim the farm is failing to meet the welfare needs of the animals in its care and poses a threat to wild turtle conservation. International animal protection group, the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) cites poor water quality, overcrowding, unsupervised human handling, heightened levels of disease and congenital defects amongst the captive bred creatures. Joined in support by the Sea Turtle Conservancy, the world's oldest turtle conservation group, WSPA has launched a campaign to stop the Cayman Turtle Farm from breeding sea turtles for human consumption. Sir Paul McCartney, former member of The Beatles has supported the campaign and urged the farm to shift towards a more humane, sustainable and profitable alternative. In the House of Commons, Early Day Motion (EDM) 612, entitled' Cayman Turtle Farm' calls on the UK Government to condemn the practices of producing turtle meat for consumption and help assist the farm in moving towards practices that promote the protection of turtles instead. The captive breeding programme at the Cayman Turtle farm has long-since attracted criticism from conservation groups who claim that the farm runs the risk of introducing infectious diseases into the wild by releasing turtles that have been bred in captive conditions. Experts also claim that programmes of this kind fail to address the root causes of turtle decline and efforts would be better spent tackling illegal poaching -- a problem that still continues in the Cayman Islands. However a panel of four international turtle experts that inspected the farm in December 2012 concluded that the farm had a "positive conservation impact" because it provided turtle meat to local consumers thus alleviating poaching of the wild population, it augmented the local turtle nesting population through past turtle releases, it enabled applied research of the animals over four decades, and it increased awareness of marine turtle conservation. In addition to claims of animal cruelty, the farm's business model has come under scrutiny for being uneconomical. According to WSPA, the Cayman Turtle Farm is making an average loss of over nine million Cayman Dollars (approximately $10,976,000 US Dollars) a year over the past five years and represents a huge burden for the tax payer. In April 2013 the Cayman Turtle Farm released data showing however that there are several positive indicators in its financial performance in recent years.