Nature is being wiped out in oceans and on land as the global demand for illegal wildlife products now exceeds $300 billion in annual sales—feeding international crime syndicates and rapidly impoverishing all living things.
On September 25, 2013 at Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe, poachers —the scourge of our planet—annihilated at least 90 more African elephants by poisoning their watering hole with cyanide. Earlier this month, they poisoned at least 41 mature elephants in Hwange National Park attempting to feed the insatiable Asian demand for ivory, which now fetches $1,000 a pound.
To give you some idea of how quickly humans are exterminating elephants, in 1980 there were about 1.2 million African beasts. Last year, the estimate was at most 400,000. Since 2002, the African forested elephant population has plummeted by 76 percent. In Tanzania alone the population estimate in 2008 was about 165,000. Today, there are fewer than 23,000 elephants left.
The Obama Administration, led by Hillary Rodham Clinton, has pledged to step-up the fight to save the elephants. Recently, 6 tons of ivory were seized in the U.S. and, earlier this year, the Philippines announced that it had crushed 15 tons of elephant ivory. There are simply not enough animals remaining on the planet to continue this prolonged looting spree and file another one of these poaching reports of 21 tons of elephant ivory being confiscated within one year. One may ask how many more tons this year are being gobbled up on the black market? Unknown, vast quantities.
What has happened to humans?
We are so unconscious and detached from the natural world that the media headlines now report one heinous act against nature after the next, attempting to best one another in brutality and illegal sales of animal parts.
These unimaginable atrocities against nature—killing whales, dolphins, Bluefin tuna, elephants, rhinos, polar and grizzly bears, lions, tigers, and jaguars to name but a few— apex predators crimes against humanity! Without predators to keep prey fit and cull the old and weak, diseases will spread, and ecosystems will crumble—including Homo sapiens.
What kind of a world are we leaving for our children?
I suggest that all poachers worldwide be treated like international drug traffickers, facing the harshest judicial penalties possible within all 198 countries on the planet.
Clearly it is now time to stand up and protect what remains of nature and the animal kingdom, wouldn’t you agree?
Please support the conservation work of International Fund for Animal Welfare and Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
Earth Dr. Reese Halter is a broadcaster, biologist, educator and co-author of “Life, The Wonder of it All.”