Tanzania is reportedly preparing to ask CITES to lift the trade ban on elephant ivory, much to the dismay of its EAC neighbors, conservationists, and members of the tourism industry.

In a move that would surely undermine East African conservation efforts, Tanzania has taken up the position that a sanctioned sale of elephant ivory would provide much-needed financial support to the country’s anti-poaching measures.

This comes as a shock to the East African Community (EAC), considering that last year’s sanctioning of a one-off ivory auction is to blame for igniting a scourge of rampant elephant killings throughout Africa - particularly Kenya.

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Expansion of critical habitat for tigers and the establishment of a Wildlife Crime Control Committee are among the announcements from the Kathmandu Global Tiger Workshop. But will these efforts be enough to protect tigers from China’s ‘bizarre obsession’ with tiger body parts?

Encouraging news so far from the inaugural session of the Kathmandu Global Tiger Workshop: Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal announced a 900 sq km increase of Bardia National Park, expanding critical habitat for Nepal’s tigers.

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Thanks to the controversial approval of a one-off ivory sale, illegal trade in ivory has been reinvigorated - and 100 elephants a day are being slaughtered.

The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) approved a one-off elephant ivory auction in 2008 of 119 tons (108 tonnes) - representing over 10,000 dead elephants - and this decision is believed to have stimulated the growing illegal ivory market.

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In an intense international rescue and anti-poaching operation, 46 black rhino have been moved to safer areas - and eight poachers have been killed - in Zimbabwe.

Thanks to coverage by international media, public support, and international pressure from CITES, the International Rhino Foundation’s (IRF) Crisis Zimbabwe awareness campaign has reportedly raised more than $120,000 in emergency funds to rescue 46 black rhino from vulnerable areas in Zimbabwe. And since May, eight poachers have been killed during armed confrontations with police, compared to seven known rhino poaching losses in the Lowveld.

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The slaughter of a white rhino named Heide from Thula Thula private game reserve brings the year’s total in KZN to 17. Just two days ago, another white rhino was killed at the Intaba Ingwe game ranch nearby.

Efforts to keep Heide safe from poachers were simply not enough. According to The Witness, the young rhino had even been assigned a tracker in hopes of keeping her safe from poachers.

Sadly, she vanished and her carcass was found yesterday, with her horn hacked out of her face.

Operators of Thula Thula Lawrence Anthony and Francoise Malby-Anthony said in the article that only two white rhino remain on their reserve. Heide was born on Thula Thula seven years ago.

The recent slaughter of rhinos in the province is being investigated by members of the police Organised Crime Units. They noted that the case appears similar to others in Opathe and Mfozolo.

Experts agree that the rising affluence in China is directly related to what can only be described as an organized, deliberate mass slaughter of rhinos. Evidence is emerging that poaching cartels are fulfilling “orders” for rhino horn (and elephant ivory) at the request of Chinese nationals - who reportedly pay a fee to smuggle the horns from Africa to Asia.

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Six businessmen from Tanzania were charged today for smuggling 11 tons of elephant ivory worth $600,000 into the Philippines and Vietnam.

The men were charged under 11 counts of conspiracy, unlawful hunting, exporting concealed and undeclared items as well as making false documents. It’s likely that the intricate smuggling job was conducted between October 2008 and March this year.

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Kenyan wildlife authorities believe that a CITES decision to allow limited legal ivory trade has sent a signal that all ivory trade has been resumed.

An alarming resurgence in elephant poaching at the same time that a partial ban on ivory trade has been lifted is not a coincidence. Earlier this month, an illegal shipment of $1-million worth of elephant tusks and rhino horn was seized at the Jomo Kenyatta Airport. Blood on the ivory and horns confirmed that the elephants and rhinos had recently been killed. The animal parts were hidden in coffins, and were en route to Laos. Kenya wildlife authorities are confident that the tusks and horn had a final destination of China, where the illegal trade in endangered species parts is well-established.

The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) Head of Species and Conservation Management, Patrick Ormandi, reports that since the partial lifting of ivory trade ban:

Last year we lost 98 elephants to poachers and up to today, this year, we have lost up to 73 elephants. This is a big worry and all this is stimulated because there was an experiment to trade.

From the beginning, KWS has opposed any type of ivory trade with China. A spokesperson for KWS, Ngugi Gichaga, warned that the wrong signal would be sent with the re-opening of a limited legal ivory trade.

As Kenya told them that is not the way to go because that was going to send the wrong signals, because what it was going to signify is that there has been a resumption of trade with ivory.

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Pangolins - scaly, toothless anteaters - are being poached incessantly from their native Southeast Asia habitats. TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, announced that the rising demand for Pangolin meat and scales, mostly from mainland China, is driving the disappearance of these shy animals.

The sheer size of recent Pangolin seizures is alarming:

They include 24 tonnes of frozen pangolins from Sumatra, Indonesia, seized in Viet Nam and 14 tonnes of frozen animals seized in Sumatra in 2008.

(Note: 1 metric ton = 2,204.6 pounds)

Earlier this year, 45 Pangolins were found in the possession of Thai smugglers.

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Saving the tiger has become an issue fraught with much discussion — and much of it is ill-informed and misleading.  On the one hand are the tiger-farm lobby and the so-called “believers of free-market economics” such as John Stossel (ABC 20/20) , Terry Anderson (PERC) and Barun Mitra (Liberty Institute).  They want to lift the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) ban and favor open trade in tiger-parts.  They cite the apparent failure of the ban as the primary reason for lifting the ban.  Their arguments, they say, derive from free-market economics.  On the other hand are numerous (possibly insignificant because they lack the voice) individuals who, lacking voice, have opted for the exit option and have modified their behavior to save the most charismatic of animals, the wild tiger.  Alongside are many governments and many, many NGOs that struggle to save the tiger from extinction, that struggle to keep our world one species richer and which work to enable our future generations to look at the king of the forest, the tiger, in reality, not just in picture-books.  Apart from humane motives, their arguments are supported by economists, sociologists, zoologists, conservation-biologists, etc.

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You might think Zimbabwe had problems enough, with out of control inflation, an uneasy power-sharing government and a collapsed agricultural economy, but there is always room for things to get worse, or, more accurately, there’s plenty of room, but everybody and everything want to be in the same places.

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The designated area, to be called Deng Deng National Park, is approximately 224 square miles in size, which is roughly the size of Chicago’s city limits.

Deng Deng is the second National Park created by the Cameroonian government in the last three months, and is the latest in swift actions taken to help protect the country’s abundant but threatened wildlife. Aside from the gorillas, the park will also shield a rich population of chimpanzees, elephants, buffaloes and bongos.

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This is highlighted by a recent post by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) from Cameroon, which reports on a suspect arrested by game rangers who was found to be carrying 353 parrot heads and 2000 tail feathers. The suspect stated that he had collected the material for a witch doctor who was treating his mentally ill brother.

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The auction in South Africa marked the end of a “once-off” sale of ivory approved by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) involving South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe.   Since October, the four countries have participated in a series of legal ivory auctions and have sold over 100 metric tons of ivory, mainly to Chinese and Japanese buyers.  All together, the UN sanctioned auctions have earned about US $15 million.

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