Elephants bring untold suffering to communities
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe

The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date :2005-Dec-20

THE ballooning elephant population in Zimbabwe has resulted in untold
suffering of people living around jumbo-infested areas, in the wake of an
international row over possible ways to control the growing numbers of the
endangered species.
Twelve out of 27 Zimbabweans killed by wild animals between January and
October this year were trampled by elephants, according to a report produced
by the Communal Areas Management Programme for Indigenous Resources
(Campfire).
Zimbabwe is currently home to more than 100 000 jumbos, a number that is
double the national parks' carrying capacity.
National Parks and Wildlife Authority Director General Morris Mutsambiwa
said there were 390 000 elephants in the Southern African region lying
between Tanzania and South Africa.
He said Botswana had the largest elephant population of 120 000, followed by
Tanzania and Zimbabwe with 100 000 each, while the balance was shared
between South Africa, Mozambique and Malawi.
"An Elephant Management Task Force met in Victoria Falls in May to discuss
ways of dealing with overpopulation of elephants and identified four tools.
"The first option was that of relocating the animals from high to low
concentration areas within the Sadc region, but it would be expensive," said
Mutsambiwa.
He added that the use of contraceptives as an elephant birth control measure
was also discussed.
Further, Mutsambiwa said the delegates discussed 'source-sync' dynamics of
elephant population control.
Under this method, a straying animal would be utilised by the community into
which it would have entered.
Mutsambiwa added that the task force discussed culling, but added that the
method faced heavy criticism from animal rights groups from Western Europe.
To compound the elephant problem, the Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species (Cites) does not allow Zimbabwe to slaughter above 500
jumbos a year.
"There is a lot of emotion when it comes to elephants. Cites alone cannot
deal with the problem because it is the international community which fights
for rights of animals that prevents us from killing animals. They actually
see Campfire as being in the business of killing animals," said Campfire
director Charles Jonga. He added that any one of the Western organisations
could fund a Cites meeting and easily sway opinions.
One elephant trophy bears US$10 000. For participants to enter the hunt they
have to pay a fee in foreign currency. Most of the hunters are from Europe
and could pull out any form of support from trophy hunting if they decided
the beasts were being cruelly killed, said Jonga.
While the row over elephants continues, ordinary Zimbabweans have had to
bear the brunt of sharing meagre resources with the giant beasts in a land
ridden by a three-year drought. A hundred jumbos have died so far.

What a crock of shit!

As long as we have the Western European bunny huggers dictating the outcome nothing will change. I dealt with a slew of them on my last safari. They were everywhere in the Limpopo area and you had to be very careful with whom you spoke, what you said, and what you brought back in the truck to camp. Everything had to be covered, your rifles had to be fully cased and hidden, etc. And I thought our American animal rights activists were bad!

Elephants bring untold suffering to communities
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe

The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date :2005-Dec-20

THE ballooning elephant population in Zimbabwe has resulted in untold
suffering of people living around jumbo-infested areas, in the wake of an
international row over possible ways to control the growing numbers of the
endangered species.

how do you have any endangered species with 100,000 animals in a population??!!???(maybe that would endanger a strain of yeast....)

I wish there was still the emicon with the ostrich sticking its head in the sand. CITES does not always use science when making decisions.....I also have problems with the idea that some whales, with worlwide populations in the millions or at least hundreds of thousands, cannot be harvested in a sustainable manner.


Twelve out of 27 Zimbabweans killed by wild animals between January and
October this year were trampled by elephants, according to a report produced
by the Communal Areas Management Programme for Indigenous Resources
(Campfire).
Zimbabwe is currently home to more than 100 000 jumbos, a number that is
double the national parks' carrying capacity.

This is so out of control normal hunting cannot have much of an effect....either elephants must be culled or they will die(I am assuming they are using the "K" carry capacity, the biological upper limit, and not some lower carry capacity of what the would like to have.)
National Parks and Wildlife Authority Director General Morris Mutsambiwa
said there were 390 000 elephants in the Southern African region lying
between Tanzania and South Africa.
He said Botswana had the largest elephant population of 120 000, followed by
Tanzania and Zimbabwe with 100 000 each, while the balance was shared
between South Africa, Mozambique and Malawi.
"An Elephant Management Task Force met in Victoria Falls in May to discuss
ways of dealing with overpopulation of elephants and identified four tools.
"The first option was that of relocating the animals from high to low
concentration areas within the Sadc region, but it would be expensive," said
Mutsambiwa.
I have no idea what relocating a jumbo cost....$1,000 USD? $10,000?

He added that the use of contraceptives as an elephant birth control measure
was also discussed.
Further, Mutsambiwa said the delegates discussed 'source-sync' dynamics of
elephant population control.
Under this method, a straying animal would be utilised by the community into
which it would have entered.
Mutsambiwa added that the task force discussed culling, but added that the
method faced heavy criticism from animal rights groups from Western Europe.
To compound the elephant problem, the Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species (Cites) does not allow Zimbabwe to slaughter above 500
jumbos a year.
"There is a lot of emotion when it comes to elephants. Cites alone cannot
deal with the problem because it is the international community which fights
for rights of animals that prevents us from killing animals. They actually
see Campfire as being in the business of killing animals," said Campfire
director Charles Jonga. He added that any one of the Western organisations
could fund a Cites meeting and easily sway opinions.
One elephant trophy bears US$10 000. For participants to enter the hunt they
have to pay a fee in foreign currency. Most of the hunters are from Europe
and could pull out any form of support from trophy hunting if they decided
the beasts were being cruelly killed, said Jonga.
While the row over elephants continues, ordinary Zimbabweans have had to
bear the brunt of sharing meagre resources with the giant beasts in a land
ridden by a three-year drought. A hundred jumbos have died so far.

Philosophically, I wonder what kept elephants numbers in check 500 years ago? Were they in check??? We have ther notion(False!!) that there should be a "balance of nature" and the predators would eat a healthy portion of the population and numbers would be relativley stable. With something like elephants that can change a whole landscape, could the "normal" be a long term state of decline after high number of animals followed by a poulation climb after the habitat recovered???? I think this would have to be on the scale of decades if not longer. FWIW.

pd