We are a small group of citizens in Sudbury that is very concerned about the elephant poaching crisis in Africa. It is a global issue that affects all of us as we all share the planet. We cannot let this majestic mammal disappear. Otherwise, who will be next and how would that affect human evolution? We would like to raise awareness in our community about this issue so that people can take action and help change the course of this tragedy.
Elephants are very intelligent and social beings, with emotions very much like humans, who are know to grieve their dead. Elephants are the largest land mammal on Earth. They are master gardeners of the tropical forests in Africa and play a critical role in the ecosystem in keeping the biodiversity of these rainforests which in turn keeps our planet healthy. If we lose the elephants, these forests would change for the worst.
Elephants have no predator other than humans, humans that want the elephant’s ivory tusks. Wild elephants in Africa are in great danger of extinction within 10 years, if nothing is done to stop this genocide. African Wildlife Foundation, Wild Aid and Save the Elephants state that 1.2 million elephants roamed Africa in 1979. In 2012, as few as 500,000 remain, and in that year alone, an estimated 35,00 were killed.
The killing, the poaching, the slaughter is happening because of the demand for ivory, which what the elephant tusks are made of. The ivory is then shipped to Asia and China. The poaching is part of a large scale operation organized by complex criminal networks extending from Africa to Asia..
The demand for ivory is at it’s highest and so is the price. That demand comes mostly from China where the growing middle class has the buying power now to acquire these ivory trinkets, carvings and figurines which are symbols and status and wealth. China has a growing ivory carving industry. According to the National Geographic, the Chinese government has licenced 35 carving factories and 130 ivory retail outlets and also sponsors ivory carving at schools like the Beijing University of Technology.
China truly holds the key to saving the planet’s elephants or making them extinct in the very near future. China needs to ban the ivory trade in its country, it needs to destroy all it’s ivory stockpile and it needs to close its ivory carving factories. If the demand for ivory stops, the buying will stop and so will the killing of elephants.
The ugly truth about ivory trinkets, jewellery, carvings and figures is that ALL IVORY, every single piece, represents a brutal death, a gentle face hacked with an axe, an orphan standing over a dead mother, a great bull falling on the earth with agony, a grieving family. There is nothing beautiful about something that comes from this kind of horror. We can all speak up to ask for a ban on all ivory trade in the world. No one on this earth needs ivory except elephants.
Anne Belanger Please feel free to contact me at: teegress1709@gmail.com
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The Sudbury working-group of The Media Co-op was formed to create independent media in the North, to speak to our issues and outlooks on our communities as well as the world around us. Independent media provides an avenue for people who are wishing to gain critical perspective on the issues that matter most to us, and to give a voice to those people and stories that you won't find in the mainstream media.
The Sudbury working-group site is no longer being updated and has been archived.