Grab the dragon by the tail Clearly, elephants are in crisis in Africa. Surveys are now ongoing in several locations to see how many remain. One survey, funded by the Frankfurt Zoological Society, indicated that the huge area known as the Selous in Tanzania has about 13,800 elephants left. One of the major causes of elephant population decreases, if not the most important reason, is poaching. We all know this. Africans do the poaching and Chinese do the buying. We also all know this. So where to most effectively prevent the slaughter? Although the Chinese say they are against the illegal trafficking of ivory (and indeed have destroyed some illegal ivory earlier this year) they still insist that the African ivory being sold in their shops is legal and derived from the CITES-approved sale in 2008. Let’s just make some strides in this. Test the ivory that is being carved and sold. It is not difficult and the DNA techniques are in place – for example in the laboratory of Sam Wasser in Seattle in the USA. Any ivory from eastern and western Africa is automatically illegal, and any shop or carving factory in possession of such ivory should be closed and all assets seized. WildAid has an oft-repeated motto – “When the buying stops, the killing can too”. I would like to coin a new one “When the testing starts, the sellers will be exposed”. See the full blog here: lionaid.org/blog/2014/08/want-to-stop-elephant-poaching-test-the-ivory-being-sold.htm
Posted on: Mon, 04 Aug 2014 16:36:00 +0000
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