AFRICA WILDLIFE : Horror as entire family of elephants slaughtered for ivory
African Elephants in Amboseli National Park. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Armed wildlife rangers on Tuesday night fanned out across eastern Kenya in pursuit of ivory poachers who killed an entire family of 12 elephants in the country’s worst single such slaughter since the 1980s. The Telegraph reports
Eleven adults and one infant calf died in a “targeted and efficient” attack highlighting the growing professionalism of poachers bankrolled by international criminals supplying soaring demand for ivory in the Far East.
Six of the animals lay in one heap, their tusks hacked out with machetes.
None of the family group managed to flee further than 300 yards before they were gunned down and their ivory removed.
The calf, less than a year old, is believed to have been crushed by its dying mother as she fell to the ground.
“It is unimaginable, a heinous, heinous crime,” said Paul Udoto, spokesman for the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS).
“We have not seen such an incident in recent memory, it’s the worst single loss that we have on record, and our records go back almost 30 years.
“These were professional killers. The attack was targeted and efficient.”
The poachers, armed with automatic rifles, had already fled but there were hopes last night that a massive search involving foot patrols, a dozen vehicles and three aircraft could still find them.
“Every possible resource is being deployed to track down these criminals,” Mr Udoto said. “They will feel the full force of the law.”
But the area where the elephants were killed, in the north of Kenya’s largest wildlife reserve, Tsavo East National Park, is sparsely populated, has few roads, and lies close to Kenya’s border with Somalia.
Privately, conservationists said they feared the poachers and their haul of 22 tusks, worth an estimated GBP175,000 on the Asian market, would already have escaped.
The attack was the latest in a surge of elephant deaths that has seen the number of the animals killed for their ivory in Kenya increase sevenfold in five years, from fewer than 50 in 2007 to 360 in 2012, according to KWS figures.
The increase has led many wildlife experts to declare the current situation a crisis worse even than the mass slaughter of Africa’s elephants in the 1970s and 1980s, which led to a global ivory trade ban in 1989.
“Now the situation is far graver, because we have fewer elephants left, but the demand for ivory is far greater,” said Iain Douglas-Hamilton, founder of the British and Kenyan organisation Save The Elephants.
“The only thing that will radically alter the situation now is somehow to lower that demand.”
During the last six weeks, 20 elephants were found dead with their tusks hacked out in the Samburu ecosystem of northern Kenya alone. Three females were killed close to the Amboseli National Park in October.
Experts predict that many more are killed in the wilderness and their carcases never found.
Across Africa, the situation is the same, especially in Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Teams at air and seaports in East Africa and the Far East seized more illegal African ivory in 2011 than at any time in the past, as its soaring price in the Far East drove a surge in poaching.
The figures for 2012, not yet fully collated, are expected to be worse.
Two average 10lb tusks from an adult female elephant are now worth more than GBP12,000 in China, close to double their value a decade ago. The new demand is driven by the country’s booming middle class for whom carved ivory and tusk trinkets are a sign of wealth.
Occasional “one-off sales” to China and Japan of stockpiled ivory from southern Africa, most recently in 2008, are also blamed for restarting a market that had been dormant since the trade was banned.
WILDLIFE UPDATE : No horns of a dilemma over conservation
Gnus and zebras in the Maasai Mara park reserve in Kenya. Wildebeest and zebra migration in Masai Mara. Italiano: Migrazione di gnu e zebre nel Maasai Mara. Português: Zebras, gnus e cabras-de-leque em Masai Mara. Suomi: Gnuiden ja seeprojen vaellus Masai Marassa. עברית: עדרי זברות וגנואים בשמורה. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Consumers increasingly realize wildlife needs to be protected, Li Lianxing reports for CHINA DAILY from Nairobi.
Paul Muya, a deputy spokesman for the Kenya Wildlife Service, is concerned every time he sees reports about the booming wealth of China‘s middle class. He wonders if the growing affluence will whet appetites for wildlife products and fuel the poaching of elephants and rhino in his homeland.
However, it’s not all one-way traffic: A growing number of Chinese are participating in a variety of campaigns focused on wildlife protection.
Li Yuchun, one of China’s most famous pop singers, visited a number of Kenyan nature conservancies in early October during a trip to promote awareness of elephant and rhino protection.
Meanwhile, Yao Ming, the former NBA basketball star, visited several conservation areas in Kenya and South Africa in September.
Yao pledged that he would tell the Chinese people that the poaching and trading of elephant tusks and rhino horns is unacceptable. “We (Chinese people) would definitely be infuriated if someone killed our pandas, so we are also very sad about the rhino and elephant poaching here in Africa,” he said.
In addition to the celebrities, an increasing number of Chinese are alarmed by the deteriorating security situation for African wildlife and interested in contributing to campaigns.
The Chinese lion
Zhuo Qiang, who likes to be known as Simba, meaning lion in Swahili, established the Mara Conservation Fund and established his own patrol team in 2011 with the intention of protecting lions and other wildlife in Kenya‘s Masai Mara nature reserve. Zhuo’s campaign has drawn financial support from a number of wealthy Chinese backers.
Zhuo once dreamed of living with the lions on the African savannah, but the dream has changed over the years, and now all he wants to do is protect these big cats.
 |
| Zhuo Qiang surveys the wild in Kenya. He established the Mara Conservation Fund and his own patrol team in 2011, with the intention of protecting lions and other wildlife in Kenya’s Masai Mara nature reserve. Provided to China Daily |
“It took six years to take this step. I flipped over Africa and the wildlife, especially the lions, on a trip in 2004. It was love at first sight,” he said. “It was extremely difficult for me, an ordinary person, to make the decision and come to live in Africa.”
Born in 1973, Zhuo was 31 when he fell in love with African wildlife. He had a good job in municipal government, a happy family life and more stability than many of his peers.
“Giving up all those things appeared insane to my parents and my wife. It was difficult for them to understand how important it is and how much it means to me to help protect the wildlife,” he said. “But I even asked myself many times if I really should do this.”
He said Chinese efforts on animal protection tend to focus heavily on domestic concerns, such as the trade in bears’ gall bladders, tiger bones and pandas, and even the mistreatment of cats and dogs. Many people found Zhuo’s desire to leave home and travel to Africa incomprehensible, because there are plenty of wildlife problems to be addressed in China.
Zhuo has now settled in a conservation area in the Masai Mara. He relies on his savings and occasional donations to run his protection team, mainly staffed by locals. In addition to his unpaid, daily patrol work, he has another mission – to educate both the increasing numbers of Chinese tourists visiting Africa and the people back at home.
“We must let them know what is happening on the ground and how terrible the situation is,” he said. “If we can increase awareness and tell people they shouldn’t buy wildlife products, demand will decline.”
He concentrates his efforts on school students for two reasons. First, because the school-age generation is the future of China; and second, they have influence over their parents’ generation, which has the financial clout and the inclination to buy ivory carvings or rhino horns.
“Young Chinese people are much better educated nowadays and they understand the urgency of protecting wildlife, regardless of where they are,” Zhuo said. “But they lack information and the means of gaining the relevant knowledge.”
He uses online social networks to publicize his aspirations, daily work and his plans: “The project has attracted more than 1,000 college students from more than 300 universities across China to join the education program,” he said. “Those who show the most dedication and have formulated specific plans for dealing with the problem are rewarded by being given the chance to visit us in the field to witness our efforts and join in.”
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Elephant poaching: ‘Record year’ for ivory seizures
Image via Wikipedia
More elephant tusks were seized in 2011 than in any year since 1989, when the ivory trade was banned, international wildlife trade group Traffic says. http://twitter.com/#!/LearnFromNature & http://twitter.com/#!/TRAFFIC_WLTrade.
Also – 2011 was ‘annus horribilis’ for African elephants http://environmentaleducationuk.wordpress.com/2011/12/30/wildlife-2011-annus-horribilis-for-african-elephants-says-traffic/
The group said elephants have had a “horrible year”, with 23 tonnes of ivory seized – representing at least 2,500 dead animals.
Trade in ivory was banned in 1989 to save elephants from extinction.
But it has continued illegally because of huge demand in Asia, where it is used to make decorative objects.
“The escalating large ivory quantities involved in 2011 reflect both a rising demand in Asia and the increasing sophistication of the criminal gangs behind the trafficking,” said a statement from Traffic, which monitors the trade in wildlife products.
“Most illegal shipments of African elephant ivory end up in either China or Thailand.”
Shifting smuggling routes
The group said there had been at least 13 large seizures of ivory this year, amounting to more than 23 tonnes, compared to six last year of less than 10 tonnes.
“In 23 years of compiling ivory seizure data… this is the worst year ever for large ivory seizures. 2011 has truly been a horrible year for elephants,” Traffic’s elephant expert Tom Milliken said.
Traffic said the smugglers appear to have shifted away from using air to sea – in early 2011, three of the large scale ivory seizures were at airports but later in the year most were found in sea freight.
“The only common denominator in the trafficking is that the ivory departs Africa and arrives in Asia, but the routes are constantly changing, presumably reflecting where the smugglers gamble on being their best chance of eluding detection,” it said.
In six of the large 2011 seizures, Malaysia was a transit country in the supply chain, Traffic said.
In the most recent case on 21 December, Malaysian authorities seized hundreds of African elephant tusks worth about $1.3 million (£844,000) that were being shipped to Cambodia.
The ivory was hidden in containers of handicrafts from Kenya‘s Mombasa port, Traffic said.
Mr Milliken said despite the seizures, there were generally few arrests.
“I fear the criminals are winning,” he said.
Some environmental campaigners say the decision to allow some southern African countries, whose elephants populations are booming, to sell their stockpiles of ivory has fuelled the illegal trade.
Those countries – South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe – however, deny this and argue they should be rewarded for looking after their elephant populations.
Source : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-16353204
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- Asian Demand Fuelling Illegal Trade of African Elephant Tusks (ibtimes.com)
- Worst Year in Decades for Endangered Elephants (foxnews.com)
- Worst year for elephants since ivory trade banned as large-scale tusk smuggling hits record high (dailymail.co.uk)
- ‘Record year’ for ivory seizures (bbc.co.uk)
- Asian lust for ivory makes 2011 horrible year for elephants (theglobeandmail.com)
- Record ivory seizures in 2011, says watchdog (vancouversun.com)
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Wildlife 2011: “Annus horribilis” for African Elephants, says TRAFFIC
Image via Wikipedia
As the year draws to a close, TRAFFIC warns that 2011 has seen a record number of large ivory seizures globally, reflecting the sharp rise in illegal ivory trade underway since 2007. Report from TRAFFIC http://twitter.com/#!/TRAFFIC_WLTrade
Although official confirmation of the volume of ivory involved in some cases has not yet been registered, what is clear is the dramatic increase in the number of large-scale seizures, over 800 kg in weight, that have taken place in 2011—at least 13 of them.
This compares to six large seizures in 2010, whose total weight was just under 10 tonnes. A conservative estimate of the weight of ivory seized in the 13 largest seizures in 2011 puts the figure at more than 23 tonnes, a figure that probably represents some 2,500 elephants, possibly more.
The most recent case to come to light was of 727 ivory pieces discovered on 21st December concealed inside a container at the port of Mombasa, Kenya, and destined for Asia.
Over the last 12 months, most large seizures of illicit ivory from Africa have originated from either Kenyan or Tanzanian ports.
“In 23 years of compiling ivory seizure data for ETIS, this is the worst year ever for large ivory seizures—2011 has truly been a horrible year for elephants,” said Tom Milliken, TRAFFIC’s Elephant expert.
In 2009, an ETIS analysis revealed a sharp increase in illicit ivory trade after steadily rising from 2004 onwards © TRAFFIC Click graphic to enlargeMilliken manages ETIS (the Elephant Trade Information System), the illegal ivory trade monitoring system that TRAFFIC runs on behalf of Parties to CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora). ETIS holds the details of over 17,000 reported ivory and other elephant product seizures that have taken place anywhere in the world since 1989.
Once the records of hundreds of smaller ivory seizures are at hand, 2011 could well prove be the worst year ever for elephants in the database.
“The escalating large ivory quantities involved in 2011 reflect both a rising demand in Asia and the increasing sophistication of the criminal gangs behind the trafficking. Most illegal shipments of African elephant ivory end up in either China or Thailand.”
The smugglers also appear to have shifted away from using air to sea freight: in early 2011, three of the large scale ivory seizures were at airports, but later in the year most were found in sea freight.
“The only common denominator in the trafficking is that the ivory departs Africa and arrives in Asia, but the routes are constantly changing, presumably reflecting where the smugglers gamble on being their best chance of eluding detection.”
In six of the large seizures in 2011, Malaysia has been a transit country in the supply chain, a role that TRAFFIC first drew attention to in 2009.
A typical example occurred earlier this month, when Customs in Malaysia seized 1.4 tonnes of ivory (widely misreported as 15 tonnes) concealed inside a shipping container en route from Kenya to Cambodia.
Once inside Asia, the documentation accompanying an onward shipment is changed to make it appear as a local re-export, helping to conceal its origin from Africa.
“That’s an indication of the level of sophistication enforcement officers are up against in trying to outwit the criminal masterminds behind this insidious trade,” said Milliken.
“As most large-scale ivory seizures fail to result in any arrests, I fear the criminals are winning.”
ENDS
Large-scale ivory seizures, 2001-2011
| Year | No. of Large-scale Seizures | Wt of Large-scale Ivory Seizures (kg) |
| 2001 | 5 | 7,062 |
| 2002 | 6 | 19,539 |
| 2003 | 3 | 4,421 |
| 2004 | 2 | 2,750 |
| 2005 | 2 | 4,742 |
| 2006 | 6 | 16,442 |
| 2007 | 2 | 2,152 |
| 2008 | 0 | - |
| 2009 | 8 | 19,314 |
| 2010 | 6 | 9,798 |
| 2011 | 13 | 23,676* |
| * estimated, provisional figure |
||
| TOTAL | 109,898 |
Large scale ivory seizures in 2011 (some await official confirmation)
| Seized | Month in 2011 | Number of ivory pieces | Actual/estimated weight (kg) |
| Kenya | December | 727 | 2575 |
| Kenya | December | 465 | 1647 |
| Malaysia | November | - | 1400 |
| Viet Nam | November | - | 1100 |
| Tanzania | September | 1041 | 1895 |
| Hong Kong | August | 794 | 1898 |
| Malaysia | August | 405 | 2974 |
| Malaysia | August | 664 | 1587 |
| Malaysia | July | 695 | 2000 |
| China | May | 707 | 2234 |
| Thailand | April | 247 | 2033 |
| Kenya | March | 115 | 1304 |
| Thailand | February | 118 | 1026 |
Further information & images: Richard Thomas, Communications Co-ordinator, TRAFFIC. +44 752 6646216 (m), Richard.thomas@traffic.org
About WWF
WWF is one of the world’s largest and most respected independent conservation organizations, with over 5 million supporters and a global network active in over 100 countries. WWF’s mission is to stop the degradation of the earth’s natural environment and to build a future in which humans live in harmony with nature, by conserving the world’s biological diversity, ensuring that the use of renewable natural resources is sustainable, and promoting the reduction of pollution and wasteful consumption.
About TRAFFIC
TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, works to ensure that trade in wild plants and animals is not a threat to the conservation of nature. TRAFFIC is a joint programme of IUCN and WWF.
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Possibly the largest haul of ivory ever found, 15 tonnes, seized in Malaysia
Image via Wikipedia
Possibly the largest haul of ivory ever found, 15 tonnes, seized in Malaysia
Part of the largest ever seizure of ivory of 15 tonnes.
15 tonnes of Elephant Ivory seized in Malaysia adds to staggering annual toll
December 2011. Malaysian authorities have seized a staggering 15 tonnes of elephant ivory in Port Klang, just west of Kuala Lumpur; the sixth and by far the largest major seizure involving Malaysia in recent months, quite possibly the largest ever.
After the recent spate of ivory seizures in Asia – We might have hoped that the situation would improve – However the latest seizure is the largest we can remember, and is possibly the largest ever. It dwarfs all the other seizures, and in fact probably contains as much ivory as has been seized all year in the Far East. As far as we can remeber, prior to this the largest seizure was of around 6.5 tonnes in Singapore in 2002. If we estimate the tusks of an African elephant weigh 30 kilos each, this haul represents the death of 250 elephants!
The shipment originated in Mombasa, Kenya, and was hidden inside containers marked as “sandstone-made handicraft”. Authorities in Malaysia have valued the shipment at approximately £15 million. The shipment was bound for SihanoukVille, in Cambodia, a port town 115 miles southwest of Phnom Penh.
Huge increase in ivory smuggling
This ivory seizure is the largest to date in a year that has seen an overwhelming number of seizures. In the first half of 2011 the volume of ivory confiscated surpassed the annual totals of the three previous years. Between August 2009 and June 2011 the Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) has recorded nearly four seizures a day.
IFAW (International Fund for Animal Welfare) salutes the achievement of the Malaysian authorities but warns that ivory trafficking will continue to enrich international criminal syndicates and devastate biodiversity unless arrests, convictions and daunting penalties are applied to everyone associated in the trade.
Crime syndicates
“Ivory trafficking remains a low-risk high reward activity for international criminal syndicates that also engage in drug and arms trafficking,” said Kelvin Alie, IFAW’s Program Director for Wildlife Trade. “Each piece of ivory comes from a dead elephant. An elephant killed for its ivory has almost certainly been strafed with dozens of bullets from an AK-47 or suffered a long, agonizing death from poisoned food or barbaric, homemade snares and traps.”
Interpol
IFAW is working with INTERPOL to launch Project WISDOM in 2012 to tackle the horror of ivory trafficking. INTERPOL’s Environmental Crime Programme will coordinate anti-ivory enforcement operations across Africa hopefully culminating in arrests, convictions and a serious blow to the cruelest threat to elephants.
“The operations with INTERPOL we are funding are vital for saving elephants now but ultimately we must have a complete ban on international ivory. It is the only way to stamp out the trade,” continued Alie.
Source : http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/ivory-smuggling011.html
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