But the body has not received any funding from Zimbabwe’s cash-strapped government since 2001.įarawo said his organisation needed revenue to conserve elephants but its finances took a big hit in 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic severely affected the country’s tourism industry. “In 2018, we moved 100 elephants and the exercise cost us $400,000.”įarawo said ZimParks, a government body, requires at least $25m annually for its operations. “It’s an expensive process and right now we have no money,” he added. But both are hampered by lack of funds, Farawo said. Other optionsīesides culling, another option considered by Zimbabwean authorities is to move elephants from areas with a high population. ![]() Zimbabwe has the continent’s second-largest elephant population after Botswana, which boasts about a third of Africa’s 415,000 remaining elephants. Meanwhile, the population of African savanna elephants fell by at least 60 percent over the past half a century. “Very soon we will be forced to travel to other countries just to see an elephant.”Įarlier this year, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) listed the African forest elephant as “critically endangered” and the African savanna elephant as “endangered”, citing a surge in poaching and loss of habitat for the declining numbers.Īccording to the Swiss-based group’s latest assessments, the number of African forest elephants dropped by more than 86 percent over a period of 31 years. “Culling will eventually lead to extinction of these elephants,” spokesperson Simiso Mlevu told Al Jazeera. The Hwange National Park in western Zimbabwe has an elephant population of at least 45.000 īut the Centre for Natural Resource Governance (CNRG), an environmental and human rights watchdog in Zimbabwe documenting poaching, opposed the plan. He noted that the plan is still in its “formative stages” and a final decision has yet to be made, but stressed that culling is permitted by Zimbabwe laws. The vultures are no longer breeding in Hwange (National Park) they have moved to other places because elephants have the habit of knocking down trees,” Farawo said. “We are overpopulated when it comes to elephants in this country,” Tinashe Farawo, spokesman of the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority (ZimParks) told Al Jazeera.Īuthorities maintain the growing elephant population poses a risk to other animals by causing habitat destruction, and has also led to an increase in the instances of dangerous human-wildlife interaction, with dozens of deaths reported in recent years. The surplus has prompted the government in recent weeks to mull the mass killing of elephants – something the country last did in 1988 – as a population-control option in order to protect other wildlife, as well as the country’s vegetation. Savannah, dense forests to open plains widely distributed throughout central, western and eastern Africa, south of the Sahara, with the forest elephant inhabiting the rainforests of the Congo basin.Keep reading list of 3 items list 1 of 3 Botswana investigating ‘mysterious deaths’ of elephants list 2 of 3 India: Elephants in My Backyard list 3 of 3 Coronavirus gives Sri Lanka’s threatened elephants a reprieve end of list Humans lions, wild dogs, crocodiles, and hyenas will prey on elephant calves. They drink 114 - 189 liters (30 - 50 gallons) of water per day. They graze and browse, eating up to 224 kilograms (600 pounds) of food a day consisting of grass, shoots, bark, buds of trees and shrubs, fruits, and vegetables. ![]() ![]() Elephants can walk up to 40 kilometers (25 miles) per hour but cannot jump or run. ![]() Humans can hear only 20% of the vocal sounds an elephant makes 80% are on low frequencies that are inaudible to our ears. The trunk is strong enough to uproot a tree and delicate enough to pick berries, and it enables the elephant to reach as high as 7 meters (23 feet). The elephant's remarkable trunk serves variously as a nose, arm, hand, foot and multi-purpose tool. The largest living land mammal, the African elephant weighs 3500 to 7000 kilograms (3.5 to 7 tons) and stands 3.4 meters (11 feet) high.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |