It is quite obvious elephants in Africa are endangered. Without
international policies emplemented to ban the trade in ivory, it would not
be possible to discourage poaching. So the policy of a ban on ivory trade
has worked to conserve the elephant. 

Steve Bissell writes:
> They have been putting up road blocks to elephant management
>for years and clearly want a complete and total ban on ivory trade. No doubt
>some ivory trade is responsible for poaching, but the claim that *all* ivory
>trade is responsible is simply not true. 

No one is making this claim. In the past ivory was traded, and many of the
areas where elephants lived in Africa and Asia no longer have elephants
because of the trade in ivory. So the argument is not cogent that *all ivory
trade is responsible is simply not true*. The reason why this is a false
statement is that the African elephant can now only exist where there is
protection. Simply put, the ivory trade has resulted in the near extinction
of the elephant in Africa. 

Once again, this is an AR issue
>trying to as a conservation issue. The issue of elephant management is very
>complex and all simple solutions are immediately suspect.
>sb

Humans are animals. What makes other animals different than us that would
necessitate them having a reduced capacity for rights to existence? What is
intrinsically more valuable in human animal life (the featherless biped)
compared to non-human animal life? 

The human species has killed off more it's own members during the last
century than perhaps all other species of animals combined that prey on
humans? Where is the element of justice in the belief or ideological stance
that non-human animals have fewer capacities for rights to exist? 

Re: Elephants

Moreover, this is an opinion which implies that the people that care most
about the conservation of this species are only preventing some people from
engaging in the ivory trade. Since the ban of ivory trade, the elephants
have recovered. 

So once again the ad hominem type argument is used against the
conservationists worldwide for effectively instituting a solution that
resulted in the conservation of this species. The total solution may involve
restoring populations of elephants to even higher levels than currently
exist. Elephants play and important function in Africa by uprooting trees,
creating wallows, and are in fact a stenospecies, or pathfinder species, so
the argument advocating ivory trade is not founded on ecological science.
The ecosystems of the world do not need trade in ivory for profit. Ivory is
nice to touch but that is about as far as it goes. It is nice to look at
when carved, but so is soapstone, and wood. 

The management of elephants may in fact involve some harvesting of them in
the future. However that kind of approach is not in itself something that
should be part of the ethical imperative to conserve a species unless there
is general agreement amongst managers that some harvesting is possible and
perhaps beneficial for the elephant and it's habitat. I would think that
other predators of the elephant should be assisted as well by the creation
of more elephant habitat (largely displaced from agricultural lands, etc.).

Perhaps core reserves that are interconnected with limited use areas where
some harvesting is permissible is a good practice to confer gene exchange, etc. 

Another fitting management option may be to assign tenure over these limited
use areas where some harvesting of wild animals is given to local and
indigenous communities. Bush meat is much cheaper than is agricultural meat
in Africa for the most part. Many ungulates are good at converting native
grasses and vegetation to protein.

However, the current partially lifting of the ban on ivory trade is not good
because of poaching, etc. 

Anyway the conclusion is that with the ban on ivory trade, the elephant has
benefitted. In the future if populations and habitat are restored to
suitable levels, then perhaps some bush meat from elephants and ivory from
the tusks can be traded. 

The poachers like the largest and oldest tusks of the largest and oldest
males. So that is not a good harvesting strategy.

chao,

john foster


"You never know where fish will go."




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