Elephants are still being mercilessly hunted and killed because of their tusks. The recent proof for this comes from Malaysia where customs officials have seized elephant tusks worth more than $750,000. These tusks originate from South Africa.2011 was a really bad year for African elephants with around 23 tonnes of ivory seized, which in rough numbers equates to 2,500 dead elephants. This refers only to seized ivory so you can imagine the whole scale of dead animals.
Illegal hunting and killing of elephants must stop - elephants are already in trouble because of reduced habitat so the last thing they need right now is well organized poaching gangs hunting them. The black market for ivory sadly does not think so.
The black market for ivory is in constant demand for more elephant tusks and is constantly growing. The current estimates say that the worth of illegal ivory market is more than $12 billion.
The number of elephants is on constant decline, today there are less than half million elephants still left in the world while century ago there was more than 10 million elephants.
Trade in ivory was banned in 1989 but sadly this hasn't done much good because elephant poaching still continues.
The saddest fact in the whole story is that on global level more tusks were seized in 2011 than in the previous 22 years.
The poverty and hunger on Black continent make things easier for poachers and elephants are paying this with their lives. It's a sad world we live in. Really sad.
It's really terrible in Kenya.Anti-poaching units have been created in several wildlife related organisations but it hasn't stopped yet.
ReplyDeleteThe root problem is not being addressed:leadership and ethics. Thus,people will always be greedy for more money irrespective of the means.