Lately, elephant poaching in Africa has been increasing at an
alarming rate. Kenya, whose elephant population has – according
to the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) – increased from 16,000
elephants before the 1989 CITES ban on ivory trade to the
current 32,000 – has seen its fair share of this poaching. It is
now becoming a big problem and we are likely to see a sharp
decline in the population of the African elephant if poaching
remains unchecked. But how did this sudden increase occur and
how can we solve it? First, this problem is not a problem of
Kenya alone. It is happening all over Africa. Whereas the KWS
blames the CITES-sanctioned one-off auction of ivory from
southern African states to China and Japan for the sudden
upsurge of poaching, there are indeed other factors that come
into play. The upsurge in poaching is not a direct consequence
of the auction although it did trigger the growth in demand.
What happened is that the auction made legal ivory available in
the market and that was the danger. The su