With the high demand for ivory in electronics, art, and objects of decorative value, the number of elephants in the wild are diminishing drastically. Poachers take advantage of the poorly secured reserves to obtain the ivory. Elephants in wildlife reserves across sub- Saharan Africa and West Africa are being slaughtered to feed the lucrative and unjust business called the ivory trade. If nothing is done to bar the slaughter, or at least retard it, the elephants will pay the ultimate price, extinction. The boundaries that are in place to stop the poachers are having little to no affect at all. The groups of poachers are not to be underestimated. In November 2011, Celine Sissler- Bienvenu, a regional director for the U.S.-based International …show more content…
Greed and money controls the mindsets of those hunting the Elephants. Poachers do not worry about how many they kill. They do not understand the effects of their actions and what they are doing to the Elephant population. The slaughter could lead to the extinction of these creatures if the numbers of elephants taken is not trimmed down. CITES, the world's official organization standing between the slaughter, says that “in which Africa is said to have lost half its elephants, more than 600,000 in just those ten years[1980s}”(Christy). Wiped off the face of the earth in just ten years, half of the elephant population destroyed. Trying to imagine how much the population went down after thirty years is mind boggling. The urge to make more money drives the countless groups to hunt and kill until nothing is available to kill. Without older elephants there to breed they can not procreate and keep the population at a sustainable level. Elephants are not the only ones that are affected by the ivory trade. Many park rangers have lost their lives due to confrontations with poachers. The violent groups of criminals show no mercy when someone gets between them and money. One can understand why it would seem hard to find people willing to be park rangers. The International Union for Conservation of nature said that “Last year’s death toll has reached 102, with poachers and militia responsible for 69 of those …show more content…
Smugglers and poachers do not appear to be fazed by laws put in place to prevent the collection of ivory. Because of decline in number of animals who contain ivory, the buying and selling of it has been banned in many countries. Sales of elephant obtained ivory became illegal on ebay after a large slaughter of elephants in Chad. Poachers still find ways to get around the laws. A ban was introduced by CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) 1989. Smugglers found different ways to get past officers with ivory. One ivory smuggler explained a common way to smuggle ivory: “Wrap it in old, stinky underwear and pour ketchup on it. So it looks shitty with blood. This is how it is done”(Christy). No normal person would want to touch bloody and soiled underwear. That is the point of that smuggling practice. If people are going to actually be held accountable there needs to be trained people who know what they are looking for to catch the smugglers. The reward for the smugglers is well worth the risk. Some smuggler prefer to just take the risk and see if they can bribe a guard but if he fails then he will be sent to jail. Some groups trying to bar the trade of ivory result in burning stockpiles of ivory. In 2011 the born free foundation confirmed that “Kenya burned 4.8 tons of ivory seized by Lusaka Agreement Task Force in Singapore”(Born Free Foundation). Burning all that ivory keeps
There’s another catch to trophy hunting: it is extremely expensive. Permits for trophy hunting usually cost thousands of dollars, which leads to the idea that killing animals can actually help conservation. This concept might seem ridiculous at first, but trophy-hunting permits bring in a plethora of money. For instance, the so-called “ten-day ‘elephant package’ could cost… 36,000 [dollars]” (learnenglish). Even if you merely wish to watch the hunt, you are obliged to pay 3,800 dollars (abcnews). The prices are strikingly high, meaning that so is the revenue. South Africa alone brings in more than 744 million dollars every single year, making it its “most profitable form of commercial land use” (learnenglish). This enormous amount of money can not only be used to aid the many third world countries in Africa, but also with conservation. Many argue that by killing wild game during hunting, it causes some species to go extinct. However, strong economic incentive has motivated landowners to expand their territories, reintroduce species, and take care of the animals in general, which would indicate the opposite: more animals are safe. One might even conclude that the world is saving animals, by killing
Wildlife conservationists are constantly working to supervise the rivers, forest, and other natural resources of Africa in order to preserve and protect them through prudent management. In Kenya, laws against trophy hunting has assisted these conservationists in maintaining wildlife populations. However, park rangers face a huge battle against the illegal poaching of these rare trophy animals, such as lions and elephants. In Asia, the demand for ivory continues to surge, despite the long-time ban on its international trade. The demand is so high that the Tanzanian government has developed plans to construct a commercial highway through the Serengeti in order to more efficiently trade goods with Asia (“The Need for Serengeti Watch”). However, the highway will also provide a faster route to the coast for ivory smugglers. The controversy surrounding the highway and its positive or negative effects on the economy, Tanzania as a whole, and the Serengeti is countless. Despite the debate over its benefits and...
“Many airlines now ban shipments of African “Big Five wildlife trophies. Celebrities around the world, as well as the media, are condemning the illegal killing of animals for sport. The United Nations has also spoken out in a historic resolution on wildlife trafficking by the U.N. General Assembly that “strongly encouraged governments to commit to targeted actions to eradicate supply, transit and demand for illegal wildlife products” (Source 4). Countries, media, and celebrities are now discouraging the illegal killing of large game and urges the governments of many countries to enact laws to stop the black market distribution of these predators. It is important to prohibit illegal trophies and to enforce these laws with punishments and fines to remove species from the endangered species list and stop extinctions. Stricter laws and regulations can protect and save entire species from ceasing to exist. “Just months after the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History accepted a $20 million donation from big-game hunter Kenneth Behring, the Institution sought a FWS permit to import the trophy remains of two endangered wild sheep that Behring shot in Central Asia…After a storm of ugly publicity, the Smithsonian abandoned the permit application” (Source 1). The case of the Smithsonian Museum attempting to import two endangered sheep is just one
Did you know that 100 African elephants are killed each day? According to, At Issue hunting is the practice of pursuing and killing live animals for food, recreation or trade. The Pro View is that hunting is an important component of managing wildlife populations. The Con View is hunting opponents argue that more hunting regulations are needed to prevent animals from going in to extinction (Sirs Data Base). This paper will examine the Pro, Con and my viewpoint on should trophy hunting be banned.
Elephants are an endangered species and they should not be killed for their ivory or they will become extinct. In the article The Poaching Problem the author writes” elephant populations have declined to dangerously low levels.” At the rate that poachers are killing these innocent animal the entire species of elephants will be extinct in the year 2030! That is only twenty five years, I know that does not seem like a long time but it is going to go by fast and every one will regret killing all those poor innocent gentle creatures. In case study 483 they author writes “ During the 1970s and 1980s elephant poaching had included about 1.3 million elephants killed for their tusks.” It is hard to distinguish between legal and illegal ivory so it is sold easily.
The African elephant’s range has declined by over 50 percent since 1979 – and their populations are breaking up
The Chinese government distributes around five tons of ivory each year to markets whose demands are much higher, therefore leading to the illegal marketing of ivory. Furthermore, Hong Kong’s government system was also brought into the light, thanks to an investigative journalist who appeared in The Ivory Game, by the name of Hongxiang Huang. While there, he spoke to an ivory dealer that explained the process of selling illegal ivory through a flawed government system. The ivory that he sales is considered legal, because he registered it without specifying an exact amount when it was outlawed, thus he can fill his inventory with illegal ivory allowing him to sale it with no repercussions. If he can get away with selling ivory through this process, how many other people are using the same flawed system to sale theirs? When Hongxiang Huang visited a local village in Vietnam, he once again proved the system is broken by learning that ivory is transported across the border to China by bribing the police on both sides. In other words, they can use a small fraction of their earnings to pay off law enforcement to continue trafficking the ivory. If the government can’t fix these defective systems first, then there will be no hope for saving the African
Elephants have been threatened by poachers! Do you know what poachers are? Poachers are people that hunt and kill animals/Elephants for Ivory. Ivory is an elephant’s tusk. Even a walrus tusk. Ivory could also be known as teeth. Even though it was illegal, poachers were still hunting for elephants. Killing the elephants helped the poachers, because they could use ivory to trade for food. The food that they traded would usually help the poacher’s family survive. Most people would poach if they were poor. And that’s what it was like.
Poachers use a wide variety of ways to hunt for ivory. When they hunt for it they mostly hunt for elephants. Elephant poaching is a terrible thing. It would be very difficult for them to keep breeding, if elephants go extinct our forests wouldn't survive, and their habitats would get wiped out.
As the WWF has been helping to keep elephants away from the harm of people, they have also teamed up with TRAFFIC, the “international wildlife trade monitoring network, to reduce the major threat that illegal and illicit domestic ivory markets pose to wild elephants” (Elephant). TRAFFIC, in addition to reducing the ivory threat to elephants, pinpoints specific routes of ivory trades and stops them. This is very important to the Sumatran elephants because the ivory trade is one of the main issues that they deal with and with TRAFFIC trying to stop it, they may actually have a
Why is poaching a concern? What can be done to “turn the tide” against poaching? Poaching is a devastating thing in wildlife. I am explaining this act because poaching makes people sick at heart, a lot of people want to stop this depressing source of action. Wildlife animals should be treated like humans and they shouldn’t be killed for food and other reasons such as ivory. Humans aren’t killed for food like animals are and we have freedom and for the most part live a happy life. It is so sad seeing this happen with these different animals. This devastating and upset poaching act is making people not want to go to the circus and other animal shows because they abuse those animals for no apparent reason and they take these animals out of their natural habitat. Possibly if we didn’t have a circus it would stop people from taking them from their habitat or from the wildlife and other people won’t think it’s okay for this act to happen.
The poaching of animals gets worse every year. Today, it threatens to erase decades of conservative gain and the last of the world's wild tigers. “There are only around 3,890 left outside of captivity.” Wildlife crime is a huge business that is run by dangerous international networks. Animal parts are trafficked much like illegal drugs and weapons. It
According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), endangered elephants and tigers are being illegally hunted for ivory and skins. Some humans believe this is important because they are not even killing elephants and tigers for any other reasons. If they do kill these animals, which is horrible as it is. They should at least use and enjoy all of these animals. Not just the tusks and furs the animals have. Most people only care about trading goods and getting money from killing animals. They won’t give a second thought about the lives of these species, or if it benefits their lives. People should understand this is pretty selfish. Animals are important, and humans should be the reasons these populations are increasing not
Elephants have long been hunted by man for their meat, oil and hide. More significant however is the hunting of elephants for ivory. Elephants are the most common source of ivory in comparison to other sources such as hippopotamus, mammoth fossils, sperm whale and walrus (Burack 1984). Ivory is a certain type of modified dentin, existing as certain types of teeth which generally extend out of the mouth of an animal. Identified most commonly as the tusks on an elephant, they act as necessary tools for existence, helping to obtain food and for situations where attack or defence from a threat are required (Ross 1995). An elephant’s strength to lift and support objects is enabled through the tusks which exist on the elephant as the two upper incisor teeth, embedded as part of the skull and upper jaw (Ross 1995). Their length differs dependent on the age, sex and species of the animal. As a material, ivory is somewhat comparable to materials such as bone, marble, alabaster, white jade and shell. However, its physical structure provides a uniqueness from other materials – it is soft and easily workable, however incredibly durable and...
Animal poaching clearly has adverse side effects that affect the wildlife population, the environment, and the economy as a whole. In our recent times, elephants, rhinos, and tigers among others wild animals are among the most hunted animals that are sold to the black market by poachers. Elephant ivories are of high value to buyers due to their manufacturing and art use, while tigers’ pelts, bones, and organs for their claimed unique capabilities to heal all kinds of dysfunctions and illnesses. As for rhinos, their horns are curved out for their therapeutic, aesthetic, and at times cultural value.