E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSS
F Grossmann / Wildlife Conservation Society
People believed to be wildlife poachers dry meat in the wild in southern Sudan in a photo taken on July 30, 2008.
JUBA, South Sudan -- The once-thriving elephant population of South Sudan could be wiped out in five years if rampant poaching is not brought under control, a wildlife protection group said on Tuesday.
After decades of civil war the African country, which became independent last year, has fewer than 5,000 elephants left, down from around 130,000 in 1986, according to the United States-based Wildlife Conservation Society.
Driven by demand from China, the price of ivory has quadrupled in the last few years, Paul Elkan, South Sudan director at WCS, said.
"Within the next five years the elephants in South Sudan could completely be gone with the current rates of poaching," Elkan told reporters.
He said 2011 was the worst year on record for poaching worldwide, with 24 tons of ivory seized.
Black market trade in wildlife and wildlife products is worth an estimated $10 billion per year, according to the Coalition Against Wildlife Trafficking, a group of government and wildlife organizations.
Elkan said the southern rebel army ate much of the country's wildlife during the 1983-2005 civil war against the Khartoum government in the north. Raiders from the north also massacred wildlife, particularly elephants, he said.
South Sudan's zebras and rhinos may have already been wiped out, Elkan said, warning that the new nation's giraffes are also on the brink of extinction.
South Sudan's infrastructure has been devastated by years of war and economic neglect, and conservationists are now worried new road construction will make poaching and trafficking easier.
"Those elephants that survived the war are having a hard time surviving the peace," Elkan said.
Gabriel Changson Chang, South Sudan's minister of wildlife conservation and tourism, said South Sudan has struggled to prosecute poachers and smugglers because it lacks the laws to try them.
The government hopes to pass anti-poaching legislation in the middle of 2013 to help end the illegal trade, he said.
"There must be a legal framework so that when they are apprehended, they are tried according to specific articles of that act," Chang told reporters.
He said the government was reviewing a 30-year land lease agreed in 2008 with the United Arab Emirates-based Al Ain National Wildlife. The deal gave the Gulf company a hotel and wildlife concession in the pristine grasslands of the eastern Boma National Park.
The minister said the company had built a 50-room lodge on the concession but had not yet opened it.
"We need to know if they are still interested in operating that facility or not. If not it will be auctioned out to other interested investors."
South Sudan wants to set up a safari tourism industry based around the migration of an estimated 800,000 white eared kob antelope -- one of the largest migrations in the world with numbers that potentially rival the migrations in Tanzania's Serengeti plains.
Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Leave a Comment:
Dear Friends:
The mighty elephant! Remember Dumbo the cartoon from Disney? Can zoos around the World get one elephant and one lion each of male and female and save the population world wide? Historically how many are there and have actions been taken to protect these and other animals that are endangered? British did so much historically? How many other nations? What and where and when why these are excellent papers to write and also essays for all ages. Thee can make a difference and We. Amen.
Dear Friends:
Certainly there are zoos around the world that can help take a few and protect these! USA!??
All God's Children what if there were no more lions or elephants as the two articles on the MSN are talking about? We cannot just stand around and look as the persons in this photo, can we????
Thesis writer's advicates for the protection of endangered species? We can make a difference!
Amen.
Man has a way of killing everything. We seem to love killing each other. We are doomed.
Dear Friends:
Did God Almighty tell us how to save the animals in the story of Noah's Arch? What other Biblical stories?
He put a male and female on a Boat and took them out of danger. They most likely were young and healthy!
His example is written for mankind in all the stories.
Also in the manger in Bethlehem, the little Baby Jesus is born. A sacred cow, a lamb with the Shepherd Boy and a donkey. Little Children of all ages the Christ Child was saved too and saved mankind.
The Shepherd Boy was this the Christ Child in the future seen of himself and others. The Child is given a gift of life like mankind. The Kings brought which gifts to the Baby? How and why were they special?
The Shepherd Boy and playing his drum is this in all four of the Books of the Bible about the life of Jesus?
Why? What song would he have played? Any where that this is suggested? How peaceful would the sleeping baby Jesus be? The Kings would have been from Abraham's offspring. Near and far People come to pray and celebrate the Christ Mas (Christ Mass) on Christmas Day.
A Star! The Light of God not only shine upon Him, but was also in the little Baby Jesus for the World to see and experience the Peace that was there. Including the Peace of the Arabs and the Jewish Joseph and Jewish Mary. Little Children of all ages, the beginning of the Christianity on Earth is with the Birth of Jesus Christ. As Mary and Joseph were Jewish and the Kings that were not only there on the birth of Jesus but in the Nations where God had given them nations and among those that would also here the news of the Birth, and some became Christians. Christianity also needed then and today the history and the Hebrew and Arabs that knew God and knew His word and the Prophecy of the Birth of Jesus Christ!
May we all know that the Christmas is not the same as the celebration of Saint Nicholas also known as Santa Clause ( Saint Klaus) who was born in Germany and really did use Reindeer to pull his sled as he went through the mountains and brought little gifts of fruit, nuts and little pieces of candy for the poor. Each year throughout his life and was declared a Saint by the Roman Catholic Church. His story spread through out the World. But not as far or lasting as the Birth of Jesus Christ. That is why the story of Jesus and the Celebration takes place each Mass in the Catholic Faith. Is that true in all Christian faiths?
We Thank God Almighty in Prayer and Thanks in our raised songs, hymns and love and Peace for all of Mankind.
My Dear Friends among you that are Arabic and Hebrew please come here in public and share your Holidays of the Season and their meaning and practice.
The Celebration of Santa Claus can be shared by all faiths including atheists! It is a Celebration of Sharing with our loved ones and friends and those that are less fortunate than others, what a wonderful cause.
Educators when the written word gives examples and or meaning or comparable within the Prophecy and the word of God, what are these called? Little Children of all ages Do you know the difference?
God Bless and Amen.
What does this crap have to do with elephant poachers? Speaking of crap, who cleaned out the bilges in the Ark during this forty day and forty night excursion?
Can't the drones take those damn poachers out? NOW!!!!!!
Yes, I am quite sure that drones can be used to manage these wildlife areas very effectively in the future. Thanks for the suggestion! - RC
The problem is that the Sudan can barely afford paper airplanes, let alone sophisticated surveillance drones.
The government needs to harvest the ivory and sell it to fund the program to help these elephants, and replace their tusks with clearly visible prosthetic tusks which are held in place by easily visible metal bands. This program can be easily funded by the proceeds from the government sale of this ivory. - Rick Carter
PS - Even wooden tusks (with metal tips) can be used as prosthetic tusks, if they are properly treated and replaced from time to time as needed. - RC
PSx2 - You can also add a metal shaft in the middle of the (laminated?) wooden tusk in order to strengthen it further. - RC
International safari tourist industries which allow people to "hunt" these elephants using laser / photographic rifles can also be used to help fund these programs to help these elephants survive. The presence of these international safari tourists would help to discourage any poachers at the same time, especially since these tourists can potentially shoot these poachers photographically as well. Prizes would be offered for the best "shots", and these photographs could also be sold once these laser spots have been photoshopped out. - RC
People's "trophies" will be the photographic album of all the wildlife which they shot on their safaris, to look at and share with others for many years to come. - RC
What a pity. It's too bad that the human parasites infesting south Sudan aren't disappearing too.
Drastic times call for drastic measures. Elephant #s are DWINDLING. Human #s are soaring unabated, it is time to get medieval on those associated with the poaching of the animal--from the poachers, to the exporters, to the importers to the end user.
Any and all those thought to be tied to such acts should be given the Wheel. Break them on the Wheel, but not until after their family suffers the same fate before their eyes. Witnessing one Wheeling and no one will dream about any action resulting in the punishment.
WHEEL them.
When you see park rangers having a half a dozen or more children living in one room huts you know that this problem is not going to be resolved. Until the African people and the west decide to educate and use contraceptives the problem of overpopulating the carrying capacity of their environments will continue. The hunting tradition will continue until there aren't any wild animals left and then the hunters families will starve war will break out and groups will band together pointing fingers and blaming each other for their problems. They will not blame themselves or face the responsibility of sustainable birth rate growth. What a sad waste especially for the wild animals.
Nothing new here, the populations of all large mammals will dwindle as humans bred like flys and displace or destroys all others. We either kill them for their skins, ivory, or other assorted body parts, take over their habitat to plant crops and then destroy the animlas for trampling the crops , or we simply shoot them for food.......As long as the world population increases, the population of pretty much any other creature will decrease.