The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has reported that Africa’s elephants are now more endangered than before, due to increasing threats of poaching and loss of habitat.
The African forest elephant is critically endangered, and the African savanna elephant is endangered. They were considered one species and classified as vulnerable by the IUCN.
The population of savanna elephants dropped by more than 60% over a 50-year period, while the number of African forest elephants has fallen by over 86% over a 31-year period, according to the IUCN, which rates the global extinction risks to the world’s animals.
Overall, Africa has around 400,000 elephants left, counting both the savanna elephants and forest elephants together.
Poaching of elephants is a symptom of destabilized and corrupt government and officials in certain areas.
“Eighty to 90% of our ivory goes to Nigeria and ends up funding (the jihadist rebels) Boko Haram. So it’s very much a cross-border fight against organized crime and even against terrorism,” said Lee White, Gabon’s minister of water and forests, according to the Associated Press.
The demand for ivory could push the elephants in the continent to even more worrying numbers in the upcoming years, as criminal networks working with corrupt officials remains a large problem.
