CONSERVATION NEWS
Letter to President Masisi of Botswana!
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EMAIL TO: op.registry@gov.bw
DATE…
Dr. Mokgweetsi Eric Keabetswe Masisi
His Excellency, President of the Republic of Botswana,
Private Bag 001, Gaborone
Botswana
Fax: +267 390 4017
Your Excellency, President Dr. Masisi,
The undersigned organizations representing millions of members and supporters around the world write to you today to sincerely and humbly request that you do not reinstate trophy hunting and that you also do not allow regular elephant culling.
In recent years Botswana has been hailed as a shining example of wildlife conservation, and a safe haven for elephants who are free from harassment by trophy hunters and where poaching is relatively low. Nonetheless, we are saddened of reports from the Monitoring of Illegal Killing of Elephant (MIKE) Programme under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) that have pointed to an uptick in poaching in Southern Africa. In particular, Chobe National Park has experienced an increase in elephant poaching, according to the most recent MIKE report. We also acknowledge your concern about the prevalence of human-elephant conflict in Botswana.
However, trophy hunting and elephant culling does not deter poaching, nor does it resolve human-elephant conflict A successful elephant management plan should be science-based and sustainable in order to promote the long-term peaceful co-existence between humans and animals.
We are not aware of any country or community that allows trophy hunting and that also has no poaching or human-wildlife conflict. On the contrary, some of the highest levels of poaching of elephants and rhinos occur in countries that allow trophy hunting of these animals. For instance, the number of rhino poached in Namibia has increased from zero in 2014 to 80 in 2016, despite American trophy hunters having paid over a million U.S. dollars to the government of Namibia for the right to kill one of the few remaining critically endangered black rhinos on the continent. The Selous Game Reserve, a legendary hunting ground that once held the largest elephant populations in Tanzania, lost 80% of its elephants between 2007 and 2014, despite the prevalence of elephant trophy hunting in the country. The results of DNA analysis of seized ivory confirmed that 7 out of the first 10 seizures made between 2006 and 2011 originated in the cross border ecosystem of the Selous and Niassa Game Reserve, another renowned elephant trophy hunting area.
In fact, trophy hunting is harmful to wildlife conservation. Trophy hunters tend to target prime breeding males the killing of which disrupts the social structure and causes cascading negative impacts on populations, such as increased infanticide caused by the removal of dominant male lions and leopards. Conservationists have warned that trophy hunting is often poorly regulated, monitored or enforced and lacks vigorous, regular scientific reviews. The IUCN Red List assessment for the lion states that trophy hunting may have contributed to population declines in Botswana amongst other countries. Furthermore, the big cat conservation group Panthera remarked that there is little evidence that trophy hunting fosters increased tolerance of leopards or other large carnivores and therefore offtake by trophy hunting likely compounds, rather than relaxes pressures on local leopard populations as new individuals move in to fill the niches caused by trophy hunting.
Elephant culling is not a permanent solution to human-elephant conflict. It may remove the problem for a time, but it will not control the continued growth of the elephant population, or the movement of elephants into the areas vacated by the culled elephants. Furthermore, culling causes immense social disruption, the consequences of which may result in increased elephant aggression and disturbance behaviour for many decades, detrimental to residents and tourists alike. There are many proven, science-based techniques being used successfully to mitigate human-elephant conflict in other African countries. We urge you to employ these over culling.
Elephants are an iconic African species, beloved by millions of people around the world, many of whom travel to Africa every year to personally experience the majesty of elephants and Africa’s other majestic wildlife.
Botswana should take pride that no other country can claim to be the last safe area for elephants. We urge you to continue to uphold Botswana’s upstanding conservation legacy by continuing to prohibit trophy hunting in public lands and not allowing elephant culling.
Your Excellency, we extend our most sincere gratitude for your consideration of these comments.
Sincerely,
YOUR NAME…
cc: Dr. Jeff Ramsay, Deputy Permanent Secretary for Media, Ministry of Communications, Science and Technology. jramsay@gov.bw
Tell the Botswana government to say NO to lifting the ban on trophy hunting
Help stop the lifting of the Trophy Ban in Botswana!
In 2014, Botswana made a historic move by banning trophy hunting. Now the country is considering reversing the trophy hunting ban by creating laws to help trophy hunting grow throughout the country. Botswana is also considering instituting regular elephant culling in a misguided attempt to manage their elephant populations and to use the elephant meat as pet food. This backwards thinking will threaten the country’s imperiled species, such as elephants, rhinos and leopards, who are struggling to survive intense pressures from poaching, habitat loss and human-wildlife conflict.
Chinese 'Queen of Ivory' jailed for 15 years in Tanzania!
Finally justice for selling poached ivory!
Yang Feng Glan, known as the 'Queen of Ivory,' pictured in a Tanzanian court . Photo: CNN
(CNN)A Chinese woman, nicknamed the 'Queen of Ivory' and thought to be one of Africa's most notorious traffickers, has been sentenced to 15 years in prison, Tanzanian authorities told CNN.
On Tuesday, a Tanzanian court found Yang Feng Glan, 70, guilty of smuggling 860 elephant tusks that authorities say are worth $6.45 million.
Yang Feng Glan, was sentenced along with her Tanzanian co-accused Salivius Francis Matembo and Manase Julius Philemon.
They were also sentenced to an additional two years in prison under Tanzania's Wildlife Protection Act, which they can convert into a fine amounting to twice the value of the ivory they are charged with smuggling. Authorities put this value at $12.9 million dollars.
Thank you Jan Honza Bebr & Parklane International School!
We’re grateful to Jan Honza Bebr & Parklane International School for their support.
Nsefu.org would like to thank Jan Honza Bebr & the Parklane International Schools for their support of our conservation efforts in Zambia.
400,000 African Pangolins are hunted for meat every year – why it’s time to act
Find out more about the Africa’s Pangolins plight.
Pangolins, a group of unique African and Asian scaly mammals, are considered to be one of the most heavily trafficked wild mammals in the world. They are hunted and traded for their meat, scales, and other body parts, and used as traditional medicines in parts of Africa and Asia.
Of the eight pangolin species, four are found in Africa. These are the white‐bellied, black‐bellied, giant, and Temminck’s ground pangolin. Three of these species live in Central African forests. The tree-dwelling white-bellied and black-bellied pangolins, weighing approximately 1.5 to 3kg (comparable to a small rabbit), and the ground-dwelling giant pangolin can weigh up to 33kg (the weight of a small Labrador dog).
But little is known about population sizes, mortality rates, and reproductive potential of African pangolins. Mounting evidence suggests that as the availability of Asian pangolins declines, and international trade flows increase, traders increasingly supply the more abundant and less expensive African pangolins to meet demand.
Seizures of pangolins and their scales and skins from Africa, destined for Asia, are increasing with over 53 tons seized in 2013 alone. These estimates likely represent a fraction of all pangolins traded, and an even smaller portion of the number of pangolins hunted.
To better understand how many pangolins are hunted in Central Africa each year, I and a team of researchers collated information on the quantities of animals that hunting villages extract from the forest, from studies conducted over the last 20 years. By doing this we can provide crucial information on regional trends which can be used to inform conservation actions and policy.
What we found
We looked into the number of animals hunted in villages and offered for sale by collating data from research and reports that covered over 100 areas in sub-Saharan Africa between 1975 and 2014.
We extracted information on whether the animal was eaten or sold, how they were hunted, the sex, age category, and price. Other species typically hunted for meat include blue duikers, brush-tailed porcupines and greater cane rats.
For Central African forests in Cameroon, Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Democratic Republic of Congo and Republic of Congo, we estimated that at least 400,000 pangolins are hunted annually for meat.
But we don’t yet know whether pangolins can withstand these levels of hunting. This is mainly because we don’t yet have reliable pangolin population estimates for any of the species that inhabit Central African forests. Ideally, we would also need population and hunting data in the same location to be able to understand the levels of hunting that lead to population declines.
Pressures
The pressures on African pangolins are likely increasing for several reasons.
Firstly, increasing deforestation across West and Central African countries has reduced their habitat, particularly for the semi-arboreal white-bellied pangolin and the arboreal black-bellied pangolin, which rely on forest habitats.
As the human populations grow in West, Eastern and Central Africa, this may exacerbate trends in deforestation and wildlife consumption.
Secondly, increases in the accessibility of remote areas to people and extractive industries may lead to more pangolin hunting. For example, a recent study showed that Asian industry workers in Gabon requested pangolins from hunters more than any other species.
Finally, the international trafficking of pangolins over the past decade has boomed. They are one of the most trafficked wild mammals in the world. For example, eight tonnes of pangolin scales trafficked from Nigeria, one of the largest ever hauls of scales, was intercepted a couple of weeks ago in Hong Kong.
Time to act
While the media has greatly increased its coverage of the plight of pangolins in recent years, financial and political support for conservation is still greatly needed. This includes support for pangolin population monitoring, identification of pangolin strongholds and areas in need of conservation, and the identification, design and testing of conservation interventions, where needed.
Without these steps we may see the African pangolins follow in the footsteps of their Asian counterparts.
Daniel J Ingram, Researcher in Conservation, UCL
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.