South Africa is considering culling elephants as the population soars and leads to worries of environmental degradation. But animal rights organizations are retaliating by threatening to call for a tourism boycott.
South Africa is considering culling elephants as the population soars
and leads to worries of environmental degradation. But animal rights
organizations are retaliating by threatening to call for a tourism
boycott.
South African game reserves are the most intensely managed in Africa
and some conservation officials and scientists have consistently argued
that there is serious elephant overpopulation that needs to be reduced to
limit the effect on habitats.
South African newspapers reported in mid March that Dr Hector Magome,
the director of conservation services at South African National Parks (SANP),
said SANP was "strongly leaning towards culling and we want the
public to digest this hard fact". He says that Kruger National Park,
with more than 12,000 elephants, is overpopulated by at least 5000.
Reasons for culling
Scientists are divided on the issue of elephant overpopulation and the
ethics of culling. Some have argued there is no scientific proof of
overpopulation and that more research is needed before any action is
taken.
Some argue that alternative methods of control should be adopted if
population growth is proved to be unsustainable. Yet others say that,
unless elephant populations in Kruger, Madikwe and other parks are
reduced, their feeding habits will devastate vegetation, and other species
will suffer.
Among other destructive actions, elephants damage endangered trees by
stripping them of bark. The trees subsequently die. The pachyderms consume
vast amounts of vegetation. Food sources are shrinking and biodiversity is
coming under threat. There is also often friction between local rural
communities and elephants over resources.
An article in Courier (Brussels) in 1996 focused on the animosity felt
by agriculturalists surrounding national parks in Kenya, and the concern
from human deaths caused by elephants. Campbell et al. (1996), in a study
of elephant damage in state forests in Zimbabwe, found that some 25% of
trees of >9.5 cm diameter at breast height had been damaged by
herbivores including elephants, and that 67% of larger Pterocarpus
angolensis trees had been damaged by elephants, and 13% killed.
Botswana is also looking at culling elephants, and Botswana's president
is seeking support from neighbouring Zambia for a proposal that would
allow it to cull elephants and sell their ivory, officials said in early
March.
President Festus Mogae was expected to ask visiting Zambian President
Levi Mwanawasa for support to downgrade the status of elephants under the
Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species, or Cites, an
unnamed foreign ministry official said.
The official said Botswana has an overpopulation of elephants and Mogae
wants to move elephants to a different category under Cites that would
allow them to be culled to "acceptable levels."
Botswana and Zambia are among southern African countries with huge
elephant herds that are in some cases destroying the environment. The
countries have argued that each year they should be allowed to sell a set
amount of ivory from elephants that have died naturally or were culled
under government-supervised programmes.
Southern Africa is now home to around three-quarters of the African
elephant population, and some experts and environmentalists say the
population is becoming unsustainable.
The conservation lobby
Elephants are one of the key species of interest to tourists, who tend
to be more interested in large mammals than in other types of biodiversity
(Kerley et al., 2003). This paper reports that self-guided tourists that
had seen elephants in the Addo Elephant National Park expressed
satisfaction with their wildlife viewing.
They are also an emotive animal for conservationists, partly because
they have been so affected by ivory poaching in the past, and still are in
other parts of Africa. Some lobby groups believe resorting to elephant
culling in South Africa, where it was suspended in 1994, will damage the
country's status as a responsible custodian of natural resources.
"If they go ahead it will be another black eye for the South
African government's international reputation," said Dr John Grandy,
senior vice-president in charge of wildlife at Humane Society
International (HSI) in Washington.
HSI is part of the Humane Society of the United States and has a
membership of more than 8.6-million. It has invested millions of dollars
in South Africa since 1994 on the understanding that culling had been
stopped.
HSI helped purchase land for the expansion of the Addo Elephant
National Park and funded extensive research into the use of PZP (porcine
zona pellucida) as a means of elephant contraception.
Dr Barbara Maas, the chief executive of the Britain-based Care for the
Wild, argues that the talk of a resumption of culling, coupled with the
recently published draft legislation on large predator hunting, presented
a very poor image to the rest of the world. And the founder of a South
African animal rights group, Xwe African Wildlife Investigation and
Research Centre, has gone further by suggesting a tourism boycott.
Wanda Mkutshulwa, spokesperson for Sanparks, said on Sunday "that
animal-rights groups are pre-empting the process as no final decision has
been made on the elephants' fate". Scientists are currently compiling
a report containing all the suggestions made during the elephant debate,
which will then be considered before a decision on culling is made.
Further reading
Anon. Man and elephant in harmony? Courier (Brussels), 1996, No.
157, pp. 28-30
Campbell, B. M.; Butler, J. R. A.; Mapaure, I.; Vermeullen, S. J.;
Mashove, P. Elephant damage and safari hunting in Pterocarpus
angolensis woodland in northwestern Matabeleland, Zimbabwe. African
Journal of Ecology, 1996, Vol. 34, No. 4, pp. 380-388
Kerley, G. I. H.; Geach, B. G. S.; Vial, C. Jumbos or bust: do
tourists' perceptions lead to an under-appreciation of biodiversity? South
African Journal of Wildlife Research, 2003, Vol. 33, No. 1, pp. 13-21