Alarm raised over elephant ivory trade

Abstract

Sir-We wish to express our concern over the resumption of a limited international trade in elephant ivory. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) has allowed Namibia, Zimbabwe and Botswana to sell 59.8 tons of stockpiled ivory to Japan. The sales began in April, ending a ten-year ban. They are termed 'experimental' , suggesting that, if deemed a success, further sales will be proposed. When these sales were initially approved in June 1997, an important condition was attached-that a system should be developed to measure the impact of trade on elephant populations. The recent authorization reflects the satisfaction of CITES with a draft of a trade and elephant monitoring system called MIKE (Monitoring Illegal Killing of Elephants). We feel that the approval of MIKE was inadvisable. This programme may be able to measure large-scale changes in populations, but it cannot gather the details needed to link subtle changes to causes.

Living in a risky landscape : elephant movement in response to poaching

“…Alarm was raised over the inadequacy of the international community to monitor and control poaching as there lacked a unified scientific approach across range states (Payne et al, 1999). In response to this, the global community through the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) established the Monitoring of the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) programme under its Resolution Conf.…”