The Hindu : India to press for total ban on ivory trade

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 06, 2002

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India to press for total ban on ivory trade

By P.Sunderarajan

NEW DELHI Aug. 5. India has moved a proposal for an amendment to the international convention on trade in endangered species to ensure that there was a total ban on international trade in ivory.

The aim is to revoke a decision taken in 1997 to relax the agreement, called the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES), to allow three countries in Africa — Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe — to export ivory to Japan.

Though specific, the relaxation has led to a large spurt in the poaching of elephants elsewhere in the world, including India, as unscrupulous traders and smugglers have begun stockpiling ivory in the expectation that it may be extended to other regions soon.

In April 2000, at the Conference of Parties (COP) to CITES held at Gigiri in Kenya, India co-sponsored a proposal with Kenya for the withdrawal of the relaxation. Under intense international pressure, it was decided to accept the proposal but with the condition that it would be reviewed at the next Conference of Parties.

Now, the time has come for the review. The next meet is to be held at Santiago, Chile, in November. India has moved a fresh proposal along with Kenya to amend the Convention to ensure that there was no scope for such relaxations in future.

According to wildlife experts, the poaching is adversely affecting the demographic structure and quality of elephant population in many parts of the country, as unlike their African counterparts, only the bulls among Asian elephants possessed tusks.

While ideally, the adult sex ratio in elephants must be in the range of one bull to four cows, in many areas, it has totally gone awry. The problem, according to them, was particularly acute in South India mainly on account of large scale poaching indulged in by the forest brigand, Veerappan, during the 1980s. In Periyar forest in Kerala, for instance, the ratio was found to be of the order of one bull to 100 cows. In Bandipur in Karnataka and Mudumalai in Tamil Nadu, the ratio was found to be between one to 12 and one to 15.

The selective poaching of tuskers, the experts said, has meant an increase in the proportion of bulls without tusks or with inferior tusks. This, they warned, could lead to genetic degradation of the elephant population, thus defeating the aims and objectives of wildlife conservation.

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