Elephant Poaching- Stop the Ivory Market!!

It was a very sad day last week when a lone young male elephant was killed by poachers nearby.

The market price of ivory is at an all time high of over $700 per pound in China and Vietnam, the demand being fueled by the newly rich middle classes desiring ivory carvings. Kenya’s elephant population is estimated at between 32,000 and 35,000, but estimates for Africa remain vague  - between 400,000- 650,000. The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) considers that as many as 100 elephants a day are being slaughtered across Africa - even if this number is exaggerated the problem is still massive.

Kenya banned hunting in 1977 and banned the selling of ivory, symbolically burning all its old ivory stock in 1989 and again last year, but the problem of poaching in neighbouring Tanzania where ‘controlled’ hunting is still legal is far greater, and it is from Tanzania and Zambia that most of the illegal ivory is shipped.

Until all ivory trading, legal and illegal, is stopped, there will continue to be an incentive for the poorest Africans to risk their lives shooting elephants to fuel  demand.  Priority now is to convince the older Chinese that they no longer want to buy ivory. Engaging constructively with Chinese people, who currently number over a million resident in Africa, with numbers fast rising, is clearly key.

Back to the dead elephant. The tracker dogs (bloodhounds) did a first class job of tracking the Samburu poachers to a distant village, but from here they are able to melt away. Even when this investigation is concluded and if they are apprehended, so long as there is a market and an order, there will be other poverty stricken Maasai and Samburu warriors ready to take their chances for the few dollars they can receive for two tusks. This time our Rangers were able to drive off the poachers and recover the tusks. These were passed to the Kenya Wildlife Service with a good deal of formal paper-work. They are then indelibly tattooed - taking them forever out of the market place.

So the radio network gets busy as security is increased across the whole area and the location of all herds and lone individual elephants is monitored ever more closely.

Meanwhile we treated this as a learning opportunity for all the local schools: environmental clubs and teachers from Ngabolo and Kimanjo Primary plus all the Kimanjo secondary students came to look at the now putrid carcass.  Vultures, tawny eagles, martial eagles and ravens are fast assisting the hyenas and jackals to dismember the carcass carcass. These Maasai kids have all been brought up to live alongside elephants. Despite their daily life being made hazardous by elephants they all value them as part of their landscape and heritage and they know that shooting elephants is not only illegal and dangerous but morally very out of kilter with their culture. They are taken back to school to consider how they can help to ensure the survival of elephants for their own children. 

Secondary Students on Safari

Only by stopping the market will these tusks be totally saved

Poaching, rhino horn, education ..... and China links

Everyone enormously pleased to have John back in Kenya following his trip to China. China is not only an enormously important market for tourism in Africa, but it is also a cornerstone in the education fight to combat poaching of rhino horn and elephant ivory. As powdered rhino horn now equals the price of cocaine, surpassing that of gold, the market has become so lucrative that 2011 has seen a major increase in animals lost to poaching, destined for markets primarily in Vietnam and China. In an effort to raise Chinese awareness on this challenge Laikipia Wildlife Forum has hosted many senior Chinese entrepreneurs and government officials this year to show them the important rhino conservation work being done in Laikipia in conservancies such as Ol Pejeta and Ol Jogi. In the last month three elephants have been poached in areas relatively close to the Ol Lentille conservancy. John welcomed the chance to talk to many prominent Chinese business people, and we look forward next year to being able to show some of them these animals in their natural habitat. It is great to see this growing understanding that we must all be working together to extend these educative links: if the rhino is to survive much longer the power of the camera lens and the healthy safari experience has to be harnessed.... above that of the bullet and the supposed 'curative' effect of powdered horn.