LIBREVILLE, Gabon (AP) – The growing threats of poaching and habitat loss have made Africa’s elephant populations more threatened, according to a report released Thursday by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The African elephant in the forest is in critical danger and the African elephant in the savanna is in danger. The two species had previously been grouped together as a single species and were classified as vulnerable by the IUCN.
The number of African forest elephants has dropped by more than 86% in a 31-year period, while the elephant population in the savannah has dropped by more than 60% in a 50-year period, according to IUCN, which classifies the extinction risks global for the animals of the world.
Africa currently has 415,000 elephants, counting forest and savanna elephants together, according to IUCN.
Savannah elephants prefer more open plains and are found in various habitats in sub-Saharan Africa, with Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe having high concentrations. African forest elephants – smaller in size – occupy mainly the tropical forests of West and Central Africa, with the largest remaining populations found in Gabon and the Republic of Congo.
In Gabon, the fight against elephant poaching “is more than just fighting for nature. He is fighting for the stability of our country, ”Lee White, Gabon’s Minister of Water and Forestry, told the Associated Press.
“We saw countries like the Central African Republic, where poachers became bandits, rebelled and destabilized the entire country,” said White, attributing most of the poaching and ivory trafficking to international cross-border unions.
“Eighty to 90% of our ivory goes to Nigeria and ends up financing (the jihadist rebels) Boko Haram. Therefore, it is much more of a cross-border fight against organized crime and even against terrorism, ”he said.
The battle to protect elephants in the Gabonese forest is a war, he said. “We turned biologists into warriors,” said White. “We transformed the people who signed up to watch elephants and work with nature and national parks into soldiers who went to war for the survival of the elephants.”
Criminal networks that work with corrupt officials are a significant problem in central and western Africa, Rudi van Aarde, from the zoology department at the University of Pretoria. he told the Associated Press.
“Most of the ivory that leaves this continent for Asia comes from central and western Africa. The population is suffering more from the illegal ivory trade than from environmental issues such as deforestation, ”said van Aarde.
Sub-Saharan African elephants suffered a major blow with an increase in poaching between 2008 and 2012. A worrying trend is that a substantial amount of this poaching took place in eastern and southern Africa, where about 100,000 savanna elephants were killed in the northern Mozambique and southern Tanzania during that period, he said.
“African elephants play a key role in ecosystems, economies and our collective imagination around the world,” said IUCN Director-General Bruno Oberle, lamenting the small number of elephants in Africa.
“The new IUCN Red List assessment of both species of African elephants highlights the persistent pressure faced by iconic animals,” said Oberle. “The results quantify the dramatic extent of the decline of these ecologically important animals.”
“With the persistent demand for ivory and the escalation of human pressures in the wild lands of Africa, … the concern for African elephants is high, and the need to creatively conserve and wisely manage these animals and their habitats is more acute than ever before, ”said Kathleen Gobush, evaluating leader on the IUCN team that compiles the list.
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Magome reported in Johannesburg.