Zambia Wildlife Official pays labourers with ele meat...

This documents is signed by 27 villagers who worked for the Luembe based Wildlife Police Officer cum poacher and thief, Benson Mwale, in exchange for the elephant meat he had poached. He, and other fellow ZAWA poachers, have not been suspended, let alone prosecuted.

15 February 2008
Lakwisha says that Zambians who live on less than a dollar a day need to eat elephant meat, therefore the end justifies the means i.e. killing elephant. So, to the bushfolk's everyday burden of survival with very slender support services (primary health-care, basic education, clean water...) must be added that of being a criminal. But these are Zambian civil servants who are poaching, not villagers; and applications by the community for harvesting rights of game such as impala - despite it being their right under the Wildlife Act of 1998, have been refused. Where to now Lakwisha?

Nyalugwe village scout found with tusks...

On 15 August 07, a Nyalugwe Community Resource Board village scout, Davy Zulu, paid for and controlled by the Zambia Wildlife Authority, but from hunting concession fee money obtained from Mbeza Safaris, was found in possession of a pair of tusks. He is shortly to appear in the Nyimba Magistrate's Court. Japha Mbewe, the Mbeza and Luembe Trust legal officer, is investigating.

Latest
On 22 August 2006, Zulu and his wife appeared in the Magistrates Court in Nyimba and were each sentenced to five years in prison. She apparently has a young child. Village scouts and their families are local people; that they are involved in such activities is the direct responsibility of their Zambia Wildlife Police Officer (ZAWA WPO) supervisors, one of whom is always placed in a village scout encampment. None of them, though most are involved in the poaching racket being run by the ZAWA office in Nyimba, has so far been brought to court, let alone sentenced. And word has it that the organizer of much of this, the notorious Goodson Chibeka - officer in charge at Nyimba, is now merely being transferred to Mfuwe. A disgrace, but very much a local tradition when remembering that some years ago, the then officer in charge was found with a lot of ivory and merely transferred to the provincial ZAWA HQ at Mfuwe.

A follow up on the Nyalugwe poaching syndicate...

24 August, 07
by
Peter Nyalugwe
Mbeza Safaris Liaison Officer

Ten days ago a report was made to the MD of Mbeza Safaris, Mr Ian Manning, by the owners of the game ranch in Nyalugwe on the Nyimba/Luangwa rivers, that across the river, in the West Petauke Hunting Block, many rounds were fired. They said that law and order had broken down. Mr Manning said, that he had paid out money for anti-poaching (paying $21, 000 for this in 2005), but that it was the 12 village scouts and three ZAWA Wildlife Police Officers – who his company paid concession fees to support, which were directed by Wildlife Act of 1998 to protect the wildlife resource so that safari hunting could be done.

Mr Manning then instructed me to go to Nyalugwe and to report on the situation.

19 August, 07
I met the Community Resource Board (CRB) Chairperson for Nyalugwe and he briefed me how the CRB is being disorganized. If he calls a meetings the members do not gather as they were elected due to financial and food problems for them to attend.
a) I asked him what’s the way forward? He said he suspected that my absence as Secretary of the CRB left a gap for I worked with the previous CRB nicely and able to submit returns to South Luangwa Management Unit (SLAMU) and Chilanga (ZAWA HQ) head office respectively
b) No bank statement has been received from the CRB account in Petauke.
c) The analysis book is with the Community Liaison Officer (Nkhoma) in Nyimba for auditing
d) The Nyalugwe village scouts have not been paid since the last payment in march 2007
e) The community also complains over the hiked prices of the citizens game license hunting fees for 2007 which they say will now encourage them to poach. A poor villager can he afford to buy the animals. We doubt.

20 August, 07
Met the camp-in-charge, Whyson Daka. I reported about the many shots which had been heard in the hunting block. Daka mentioned that the shootings were the combined force of the ZAWA Wildlife Police Officers (WPOs) to chase away the elephants from crop raiding in the GMA residents fields. I asked him further about who were patrolling and he had no answer. For ammunitions I asked him how are issued at the camp. He said there is a field data form which they fill in when going out for patrols and where they have used them on what purpose and finally for the returns space. These ammunitions are being kept by the camp-in-charge. This was the answer given by the camp-in-charge. Ths same Daka left for Nyimba to hand over an old man called Zuwua Ibale from Fundo village, caught with snares and game meat on the Lunsefwa river. He had been beaten and had a very swollen eye.

21 August, 07
Met one of the village scouts at Kasolo camp and told me about a suspect who was caught with an illegal muzzle loader at Nyalugwe village hanging in his verandah. The man is Yesaya Lungu who appeared in court last Friday 17, 2007. I haven’t heard the ruling. ZAWA also within the same week on 19 August, caught three men selling game meat on the Great East road at Saulo village.

The quota setting meeting on 26 July 07 heard complaints that the monitoring officers (village scouts) sent by ZAWA to check on hunters coming to hunt in Nyalugwe from other parts of Zambia (urban dwellers) were corrupting these same officers – and shooting more animals than on license. As most village scouts cannot read or write they cannot do the job very well.

The negative point of it is they have the immunity on the ZAWA Wildlife Act No 12 of 1998 section 118 part xiii which whatever thy can practice will be protected. I don’t know what proper evidence can we take.

Peter Nyalugwe
Lusaka
24 August, 07.


COMMENTS OF IAN MANNING
Clearly Daka was aware that ZAWA personnel and CRB scouts were engaged in their normal activity of killing animals and preparing it for collection by the Nyimba ZAWA office. Why did he not go and investigate the presence of such a large gang in the area? Because they were his own staff. And once again village scouts are unpaid and therefore help themselves under the eager ZAWA meat syndicate. And what of the rural poor? Well they now have increased hunting license fees, are refused game harvesting rights as is allowed under the Wildlife Act of 1998, are assaulted and hauled off to a prison unfit for decent people who simply are trying to survive, and have to stand by and watch while the Government officials kill the very animals living on their own traditional land, animals they are supposed to protect. And what can Mbeza do, the company whom Chief Nyalugwe, with the help of Asian businessmen, tried to have removed from his area simply because it had seen to it that no more customary land was stolen from the community and sold off for 99 years. Not much. Jealousy is poison.

JAMES MILANZU, I/C SLAMU RESPONDS
Hi,
Thanks for the information. ZAWA-SLAMU is equally concerned of these activities. For own information we are now sending patrols from Mfuwe and combine with scouts from there. We also had a combined team from Mfuwe and Lower Zambezi where several arrests have been made. The Saulo village arrests were from Mfuwe. It is costly but we have a mandate to protect wildlife in that area. We are making several changes in leadership like transfering those incharge, some WPOs from Mfuwe and increased investigative operations from Mfuwe and Chilanga. A lot of information has been gathered and we will continue to help until the sector is able to stand on its own again.

On salaries we have sent names of all VS for their salaries for previous months and the remaining months in the year.

Again thanks for the info.

James

Zambia poaching mayhem unabated...

A few days ago, a visitor to the Nyalugwe Open Area, on a number of occasions heard numerous shots being fired across the Luangwa river in the Nyalugwe section of the West Petauke Game Management Area. It is presumed that this is the work of the ZAWA Wildlife Police Officers and the Nyalugwe Community Resource Board village scouts, who, together with other units working within the Nyimba sector, receive unlimited amounts of ammunition from the officer in charge, the notorious Mr Chibeka, who later drives in with a ZAWA vehicle to collect the meat. Peter Nyalugwe has gone to investigate.

And in Luembe, ZAWA and Luembe village scouts caught poaching by me, continue in their posts.

In Rufunsa GMA, south of West Petauke GMA, ten ZAWA Police Officers and village scouts have this year been suspended for poaching.

Zambia's wildlife is being decimated by the very people employed to protect it.

ELEPHANT HUNTING…

2 NOVEMBER 2006

I respond to Eugene Lapointe’s article in BBC News weekly Green Room where the former head of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) makes the case for hunting and why it can be a part of wildlife management policies, posing the question: “Are bans on hunting and trade the best way to conserve species?”

In so far as trade bans are concerned, Lapointe makes a general point, which requires further elucidation. In general prohibitions don’t work, either because the prohibitors are embarked on some crusade without moral or practical merit, or because those being so prohibited from having access to something or other are convinced of their right to the prohibited entity, or are without moral scruple – or both. In the case of the ivory trade, those without scruple are the traders of the Far Eastern nations who require ivory for an ever growing market and who go to any lengths to obtain it. Therefore, if you allow the trade in ivory they will access what is available – and more by illegal means in order to satisfy demand, and if not available they will simply get hold of it by any means. There will therefore always exist a drive to satisfy demand, which means obtaining more than what is legally available; and if that legal harvest is 100 tons or no tons, the effect will be the same. Hunting of elephant, provided it is sustainable, and provided it does not damage your photo-tourism industry, is an excellent way to conserve the species, but by allowing the trade in ivory, this laudable goal is made impossible.

Poor African countries have many pressing demands on public money - with conservation standing in the queue. But the needs of the African ‘budget’ goes way beyond that, concentrating as it does on the ‘eternal scramble for Africa’ harvesting of donors so as to cover the shortfall for conservation, for education, for other development needs, but also for prestige projects having little to do with achieving the Millenium Development Goals.

It would be ideal were African conservation self-supporting, but then the conservation department, like the traffic department, the ministry of immigration, and all the rest, becomes yet another cash cow growing an ever over-centralized bureaucracy of non civil servants fattening on their slumbers and establishing yet another taxation tier set to drive investors dilly.

Eugene says that southern Africa countries have followed the philosophy of sustainable use with elephant hunting, and that they do not shoot breeding animals; this is simply not true of them all. In Zambia, despite the advisory note to the contrary from the cross-sectoral Natural Resources Consultative Forum (of which the safari hunting fraternity is a member) which cited the total lack of supporting scientific evidence as the reason for not allowing hunting, the Zambia Government, through its statutory body, the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA), issued 20 bull elephant to safari operators – supposedly crop raiders - or so they told CITES. The animals - shot by those operators with little regard for conservation, were certainly breeding animals, but they were also the icons supporting the tourism industry, supposedly the panacea, along with agriculture, for rescuing us from our poverty.

Sport hunting produces the only income in many areas it is true, so you could call it significant, but it is not enough to offer the necessary incentive to local people to stop supplying meat for the bushmeat trade and denuding their own lands of something which actually should belong to them but which has been expropriated by central government. Over the last five years, ZAWA’s income has been sourced as follows: hunting 23%; donor grants 44%; National Parks 26%; and other, unspecified income 7%. However, very little of this is invested in conservation activities with between 7 – 18% only going on field operations. What investment there is comes from the private sector and the donors. In our hunting area, our hunting quota allows for maximum gross earnings of $50 per km2 – given what we spend on land use plans, training, anti-poaching support and food security studies. ZAWA earn $10 km2 from hunting, expending $3 km2 on scouts and retaining $7 km2 for their HQ costs. The Community Resource Board, which represents the community and has the unenviable unpaid task of paying village scouts, receive $5 km2 from ZAWA as their share of hunting but have costs of $6.26 km2 for their scouts alone, though they are supposed to spend income on community projects and the like; and over the last four years – including the purchase of the hunting company, we have invested $200 km2 – an amount we actually require annually if the biodiversity and the people are to prosper. But where is it to come from?

Eugene argues that because Kenya has banned hunting and the sale of ivory, that poaching is encouraged. Zambia’s experience does not bear this out. As we speak elephant and hippo continue to be poached and our good Zambian poachers are doing the same in Zimbabwe, and doubtless in Angola where CITES is unknown and ivory sold without hindrance. While safari hunting was on the go in Zambia, between 1994 and 2002, 123.5 tons of illegal ivory went out from here via Lilongwe in Malawi to the Far East (confirmed by the Malawian Anti-Corruption Commission) – most of it probably coming from our Luangwa Valley.

It is true that elephant do wreak havoc in some areas on people, and we do need to provide income and supports to offset this, but having elephant hunted has little effect on this. We have always had animal depredations, and it will continue, hunting or no, for we have failed to deal with the problem of land tenure and wildlife ownership, and Government refuses to compensate villagers, even though under English common law – on which our law is based, and under customary law, it is allowed. And we suffer very little from elephant damage to natural vegetation where as a keystone species elephant can have an extremely beneficial effect on the ecology, something we are trying to expand upon with the development of transfrontier conservation areas.

We do need to foster sustainable use but much of its failure to take hold is not due to the protectionists abroad but due to African governments themselves being unwilling to devolve power to their rural people, to decentralize – in this being supported by the donors, paradoxically following the system they inherited at independence. And Kenya, protectionist it may be, today stands out for its vigorous programme of game conservancies, something here we are trying to do but receiving no encouragement from Government, even though statutory and customary law is in place to support it.

Zambia Wildlife Authority officers implicated in poaching

18 November,06

On Sunday 12 November 06, a matriarchal herd of elephant was attacked in Zambia’s Luangwa Valley by an AK47 wielding poacher, accompanied by seven unarmed meat carriers; an adult female and a juvenile killed - possibly another killed, and one seen crossing the river with blood on its side. Twenty-three shots were heard at the nearby Malone safari camp – closed for the rainy season, between 8.00 and 11.00 a.m.. Later that afternoon, at 4.00 p.m. two Wildlife Police Officers of the Zambia Wildlife Authority appeared at Malone and requested transport from the camp-in-charge, David Chileka – also a police reservist, and were driven inland for some 30 km to where four other officers were waiting. Nearby lay two elephant carcasses, their tusks removed and much of their flesh, numerous pieces of clothing, bedding, food and pots lying nearby, evidence of the gang. Seeing some vultures in trees in the distance, Chileka was told that there was probably another dead elephant there. No attempt was made to verify this.

The six scouts, all armed similarly with AK47’s, stated that the camp in-charge, Benson Mwale, had heard shots at their nearby camp, Ndevu, had then sent someone on foot to another camp, Kalansha – some 15 km away, for reinforcements, then much later in the day, after guards from Kalansha had arrived on foot, the armed group of six walked in the direction of the shots, eventually coming on the gang of eight, who had then run away. Firing a few shots in the air, and showing no inclination to go in pursuit, the officers then settled down to cut off as much meat as possible, the officers-in-charge of the two anti-poaching camps, Mbo and Mwale, walking to the Malone camp to request transport. A full load of meat was then delivered to the river crossing point at the nearby Ndevu game camp (where early that morning a fishermen, Gandi, had seen the gang collecting water), the officers explaining that local villagers could not have the meat as it was needed in the nearby town of Nyimba, and that they were waiting for their boss. When the Nyimba officer- in-charge of ZAWA, a Mr Chibeka, came, he reportedly recovered one bag of meat, another nine having disappeared.

On Tuesday, 14 November, the two camp officers-in-charge were seen on the Ndevu-Nyimba road, both drunk, and later, on Thursday 16th seen drinking at 9.00 a.m. in a nearby village.

Two weeks earlier an elephant had been killed in the same area and the ivory removed. Two other cases of poaching, one of a buffalo by a village scout, another of an ex-scout found in full uniform and hunting a hippo with a muzzle loader, unaccompanied by a monitoring scout as is required, is being investigated.

These disturbing events, given that in 2005 ZAWA village scouts had been caught poaching a buffalo, hippo and bushbuck, swopping some of the meat for village beer, suggest the collusion of ZAWA and village scouts in a meat and ivory poaching ring. Investigations are currently underway by the Chairman of the Community Resource Board, Mr Axon Lungu.

Conservationists continue to be alarmed at the well organized bushmeat and ivory trade in Zambia, it being recently revealed by the Malawi Anti-Corruption Commission that 23 tons of ivory had passed through Lilongwe on its way to the Far East over an eight year period. No arrests have been made.

Out there in Old Africa...

The letter from the Luembe Community Resource Board of Nyimba district , Zambia, was quite straightforward. They needed funds to pay some volunteer teachers.
“As a Board, we strongly request for this help because we fell and accept that the government has failed to send teachers there. On this point , we ask you to to come to the aid of M’Shalira Basic School community found in the Game Management Area No. 17 to assist”.

As the rains threatened, and accompanied by Gordon Mace - a supposed agent based in Johannesburg, as well as the Chairman of the Board, Axon Lungu, we drove the six hours or so to my camp on the Luangwa river from the capital Lusaka, first dropping off Axon at his family village some 12 km away. The river was low, my pontoon of a dozen 44 gallon drums and angle iron stranded, so we crossed in the banana boat, skirting a hippo on the way. That evening, lightning played continuously on the horizon. We would have to hurry.

In the morning, we made ready for the short trip to M’Shalira school, first being briefed by my staff and the village scout, Emmanuel (only there as I had needed his protective help for some Belgian volunteers I had brought out to carry out a food security assessment), on the poaching incident some four days previously where a gang had killed two elephant – possibly another, and had wounded two, all from the same matriarchal group. My suspicions were aroused, for government wildlife police officers and the village scouts working under them, though paid by the Board from funds generated by our company, Mbeza Safaris, had appeared at the camp and asked for transport to collect the meat.

An hour after leaving Malone camp, not another person or hut to be seen, we drew up to the maize grinding mill which my sons had repaired two months ago, deposited diesel for the engine, and cement for the laying of a concrete slab, being watched by the friendly villagers from a village unchanged from that of their forefathers. And when one of my men emptied a sack of empty tins and bottles I had rescued from our Malone camp garbage hole, they rushed forward to claim them. Such are the treasures of a people forgotten by the world.

We then drove the short distance up to M’Shalira Basic school: and basic it is. Close to the road, I found the headmaster, Mr Daka, resting in his grass and pole Chitenje, the crumbling and cracked staff quarters standing close-by. We drove up to the school: six classrooms of mud brick and mud floors - one new classroom built of grass walls had been added on, and signs of flooding all around. Children beavered away inside at arithmetic, unsupervised, but as quiet as the surrounding bush.
“My only teacher is away in Petauke to get his pay. We have to go every month to collect it and it takes a week. As you see I am the only one here now, ” said Daka.
“When last were you visited by someone from the Department of Education?”
“Oh, they never come here. They can’t drive. You can see.”
“And the elephant, they give us a hard life here”, he said, waving towards some mangled pawpaw trees nearby.”

I thought of how an elephant can eat 4% of his body weight in a night of garden raiding.

Later I interviewed three volunteer teachers, one a member of the CRB whom I knew, the other the Village Area Group Chairman, part of the group of six with whom I was developing a landuse plan for the 1 million acre area. We settled on K250 000 each per month, the same sum I paid to keep the village scouts employed, unpaid by Government for seven months: $50 each a month; it did not sound much but it would feed them and their families; the villagers after all earned about $.30 cents a day – if that.

Daka showed me the book store-room, which seemed well stocked. Picking up a few work books, mud fell from between the pages. The termites were at work. Looking up at the dividing wall I could see that the bricks would soon fall onto the books.

On the way back to the camp we saw a group in the distance, obviously out hunting. One of them was in the green uniform of a village scout, but it turns out that he had resigned a month ago. He is hunting with a muzzle loader for a hippo, and as required, has no monitoring scout to see that he kills and marks the animal off on his resident hunting permit. We take his name and details which I will pass on to Axon. Later I hear of another village scout who has shot a buffalo legally but had not marked it off, therefore facing a poaching charge. And word was that the Zambia Wildlife Authority had issued four buffalo to residents, when last year they had agreed not to do so, given their decimation by the bushmeat trade.

That night the full loom of the rains rents our world asunder, and the following morning, once across the river, we only extricate ourselves with the help of my cheerful gang who take it in turns to look after our camp during the rains. In the nearest line of villages we see a group of men gathered under the eaves of a hut, drinking; there among them are the two ZAWA officers in charge of the game camps. Meat for beer. Cheers.

Zambia Wildlife Authority crime syndicate being investigated...

News from Luembe, Nyimba district, is that Zambia Wildlife Authority officers from the Eastern Province headquarters at Mfuwe are currently in the area investigating the crime syndicate being operated by local ZAWA officers. This syndicate issues ammunition to ZAWA scouts and village scouts to poach animals for meat, and elephant and hippo for their ivory. As this syndicate has been in operation for many years it would be optimistic to hope for people being investigated, charged and imprisoned. However, there is little question that as a result of our work with the community over the last four years they now have some idea of their rights and obligations for the care of their land and its resources, and are now more determined to deal with outsiders stealing their resources, especially government officials.

The Zambia Office of the President investigates elephant poaching in Nyimba district...

The Chairman of the soon to be registered Luembe Development and Caretaker Community Association (LDCCA) reports that officers of the Office of The President (OP) are carrying out an investigation of the role of ZAWA officers in the poaching of elephant and other wildlife in the district. LDCCA has been carrying out its own investigation for some time and has pinpointed the source of more ivory.

Lebanese in Zambia seized for unlawful possession of elephant tusks

16:10, July 21, 2007

A Lebanese has been arrested in Zambia for unlawful possession of 55 pieces of elephant tusks worth nearly 80,000 U.S. dollars and 58 rounds of ammunition, Times of Zambia reported Saturday.

The 65-year-old Lebanese was arrested in Kitwe, Copperbelt Province after a tip-off and then handed over to the Zambia Wildlife Authority for prosecution, Rosten Chulu, public relations and press liaison officer of the Drug Enforcement Commission, was quoted as saying.

Chulu warned Zambians and foreign nationals to stay away from such criminal activities.

Source: Xinhua

Zambia Ivory cache owners sentenced to 5 years hard labour...

In Nyimba today, two Zambian nationals, one of them, Reg Gray, the elder brother of the former M.P. Lloyd Gray, were sentenced to five years hard labour for being in possession of 24 elephant tusks. The district has for some time been in the grip of an elephant poaching gang.

The killing of another elephant in West Petuake GMA... by Japha Mbewe

I am here reporting the above mentioned.

It was on 3rd July when we received the above report from Martin who is the MBEZA SAFARIS driver. According to the report, the workers who were clearing the hunting road in Ilinda area as they were clearing the road, one of the' ten poachers approached the workers and invited them to have the elephant meat which, these poachers had removed the Ivory from it these people saw the dead elephant and decided to inform Martin about the development, Martin without delay he rushed to the CRB Chairperson Mr. Ackson Lungu, who immediately informed Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA) Nyimba and your office. Martin also confirmed that there were also gun shots heard in Ilinda area.

After you had provided the ZAWA with the transport, they were deployed to the same area the same day. Two days later the Petauke ZAWA Officers were also deployed to the same area but via Luangwa Bridge route. These poachers had AK47 assaulted rifles. According to the ZAWA officers they confirmed that they had also the same information about these poachers and they said they suspected these poachers to have come from Lukwipa Lufunva area.

The Luembe Community Resource Board (C.R.B) meeting is to be held at 14th July to discuss, what would be the solution for those officers who were involved in poaching, because under the village scout the procedure is that if the village scout is involved in poaching he has to be fired from work with immediate effect, now the question will be what of the ZAWA Officers what will be the procedure for the ZAWA Officers who were involved in poaching.
So far, one Village Area Group (VAG) meeting was conducted and the community during their meeting supported the idea of writing a letter to the ZAWA and requiring them to remove and transfer these officers from our area.
Yours faithfully,

Japher Mbewe dip. pub. pros.
LUEMBE TRUST PUBLIC PROSECUTOR
C/O Luembe CRB
Nyimba, Zambia.

Encouraging news from Zambia for the elephant poaching war...

The news that Gerald Musoni has oncemore taken up the position of Chief Investigations Officer with the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA) lends encouragement for our efforts in combating elephant poaching - now running at epidemic levels. Perhaps he had something to do with the recent ivory bust in Nyimba involving the elder brother of the former Member of Parliament, Lloyd Grey.

Musomi was removed from ZAWA a few years ago, along with the present Director-General, Dr Lewis Saiwana (who went back to his farm for two years), by the hapless Hapenga Kabeta, the D-G at the time. As Saiwana represents about all of the institutional memory of ZAWA, and as Musomi was building up a reputation as a concerned and honest crime fighter, this was a grave error on Kabeta's part, as well as a severe misjudgement on the part of the ZAWA Board. Fortunately, the pair are oncemore united, reversing somewhat the recent spate of resignations and firings of senior personnel in the embattled organization. But they are going to need all the help they can get; time surely for the donors to fund the necessary technical supports for a much leaner and fully funded regulatory body. But this will require that Saiwana continue his innovative work in developing public private partnerships in the management of our National Parks - with Africa Parks leading the way, and that he address the very pressing problem of the poaching and fire situation within Game Management Areas by embracing the concept of land trusts in which the ownership of wildlife is held on behalf of the villagers. Ownership is the key here; without it the tragedy of the commons will continue.
I.P.A. Manning

The tusk detective...by Emma Marris

Published online: 5 July 2007; | doi:10.1038/news070702-12
The tusk detective
Samuel Wasser is a conservation biologist at the University of Washington in Seattle, and an outspoken opponent of elephant poaching. He talks to Emma Marris about his genetic methods for tracing poached ivory.
Emma Marris

Q. Tell me about some of the ivory seizures you've worked on.
A. There was a seizure in 2002 in Singapore of 6,500 kilograms of ivory — 531 tusks, many of which were huge. The authorities knew that poachers were carrying tusks across Zambia and into Malawi. One day they got a tip it was on the move. They went on a truck and then travelled by ship to Singapore. Hong Kong authorities got to the dock just hours before they arrived. The strong smell suggested that at least some of the ivory was fresh.

The ivory was high quality and going to an infrastructure that could get it to wealthy buyers. This is not your small-time village poacher. Everyone thought the ivory had come from multiple locations. We showed it was all from Zambia.

In May 2006, we got another seizure, in Hong Kong. It was 3,900 kg. The tusks were found when officials x-rayed a container from Cameroon. We analysed the tusks and the pieces and found that they were all from elephants in southern Gabon and maybe a bit of the southern part of the Republic of Congo. Everyone thought the poachers were a bunch of little guys operating all over. That's not what seems to be happening here. This is highly organized.

Q. Has it always been this way?

A. Before 1989 there was a period of massive killing of elephants. The population went from 1.3 million to 600,000 in 10 years. That comes out to about 7% annual mortality. It was so bad that CITES — the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna — banned the ivory trade, and the ban stopped poaching across the whole continent. It was probably the most effective international wildlife legislation in history.

The legislation was so effective that by 1993, western countries withdrew a lot of their aid for law enforcement. Meanwhile, people started to log the forests of central Africa, which created unprecedented access to its forest elephants, which are almost a different species and have desirable harder ivory with a pinkish hue. It was really easy for the poaching to get really bad really fast. Those elephants are getting creamed.

Q. Are things worse now than before 1989?

A. Between August 2005 and August 2006, 25,000 kilograms of ivory were seized. If you estimate that customs catches 10% of what goes through, we are talking almost 37,000 elephants. So now we are at 7.8% annual mortality, higher than the 7% pre-ban.
Q. What's driving the trade?

A. You've got a dramatic increase in the price of high-quality ivory, from US$200 a kilogram in 2004 to $850 now. In China and Japan, the rising middle class has created a tremendous new demand for ivory carvings and signature stamps — hankos. Plus, the CITES rules against illegal trade just apply between nations. Once you get the ivory into the destination country, there are no laws or no enforcement. So it is a formula for disaster.

There is heavy involvement of organized crime. There may also be a strong connection between the ivory trade and gun-runners.

Q. How does determining the origin of ivory through DNA help?

A. When you identify the place of origin you show where the poaching hotspots are and how these guys are actually operating. They seem to be focusing on an area and working it hard. It also forces these countries to take responsibility for the poaching going on inside their borders, because right now few of them do.

Q. How does it work?

A. The secret is to pulverize the ivory without heating it up, which denatures the DNA. We use a freezer mill. It submerges a tube containing a small piece of ivory and a magnet into liquid nitrogen. This freezes the ivory and makes it brittle. We rapidly switch the magnetic field back and forth, causing the magnet to act as a battering ram, smashing the ivory. It's fantastic. I got the idea from this marvellous Canadian dental forensics scientist named David Sweet.

We amplify and sequence the genes of interest in the standard way. The hardest part of the whole project is assembling the reference map of DNA from all over the continent. I am still working on that. Whenever I am at a meeting like this, I work the crowd to fill in any gaps we have in our map.

My genius collaborator Matthew Stephens, a professor of statistics at the University of Chicago, Illinois, developed a new statistical method to assign the ivory. Taking advantage of the fact that two populations close together are much more likely to share genes than are two farther apart, he could generate the probable gene frequencies for areas we don't have data for. That allowed us to ask "where in Africa did this tusk come from", as opposed to "which of our reference samples is this most like?"

Q. Have your studies made a difference?
A. In the Singapore seizure, practically nobody was prosecuted, including customs officials who stamped the shipment identifying the ivory as soapstone. They only prosecuted one guy in Singapore. There are so many wildlife officials and high-level government officials that are getting filthy rich on poaching. Organized crime can afford to bribe everyone.

Q. So what can be done?

A. We need a major infusion of law enforcement in Africa. What you are talking about is a bunch of Land Rovers, guns and ammunition and a little bit of a salary hike. We are not talking about a lot of money here. And legalized ivory trades aren't helping. We need to cool this market down.

Q. And if governments decide to cull certain elephant populations, what should they do with the ivory?

A. Burn it.

More ele plunder in West Petauke, Zambia.

A report received from my field workers an hour ago - relayed to the Chairman of the Luembe Community Resource Board, is that a fresh elephant carccass was discovered yesterday on the Ilinda stream ( and they suggest that there are more dead ones to be discovered), the recent site of our uncovering of two poached impala in which the local ZAWA officials imprint resonates (www.zambiaconservation.blogspot.com). But hang on, enter, one, James Milanzi, the acting o/c Eastern Province, who is doing something about it. His troops are being deployed as I write this, and we are assisting, of course. Why is there this frenzy of killing? Look at the recent CITES agreement and at the dsienfrachisement of the rural poor from legally derived benefits from natural resources. Surely, a matter of ownership under an honest and capable trust structure suggests the way forward. Are the donors and Government listening?

Nylaugwe game scouts caught poachingin the Lower Zambezi National Park...

The Nyalugwe Community Resource Board reports that some of their scouts were recently apprehended poaching in the Zambezi National Park by ZAWA Wildlife Police Officers . When questoned they reportedly said they had been sent there to obtain meat by the ZAWA Sector i/c, Collins Chibeka, based in Nyimba. Recently Chibeka organized a poaching foray by ZAWA WPOs and village scouts in the West Petauke GMA (see www.zambiaeletimes.blogspot.com). He and other ZAWA WPOs and Luembe village scouts are being investigated for their part in the killing of elephant and the removal of meat and ivory.

Ivory cache found in Nyimba, Zambia.

Nyimba Police informed me on 24 June that a few days previously, the Zambia Wildlife Investigations Unit had raided the house belonging to the former FDD member of Parliament for Nyimba, Mr Grey, and had confiscated 24 elephant tusks. A woman who had been trying to sell the tusks to a ZAWA officer, and who had recieved a downpayment of 7 million kwacha, was being held in custody. Mr Grey let it be known that another 1 ton of ivory was available for sale.

PR man for Zambia Ministry of Tourism issues statement of dubious ecological clarity...

Five Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries have struck a nine-year waiver deal for a one-off sale of ivory, ZANIS reported on Sunday. This follows successful negotiations for the sale of ivory at the just ended 14th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in the Hague, Netherlands. Bwalya Nondo, spokesman for Zambia's Ministry of Tourism, Environment and Natural Resources, said in a statement that the decision to sell ivory was in view of the ecological need to strike a balance between animal conservation and protection of the environment. "Zambia's desire to offload ivory on the market is keeping with the need not to threaten the carrying capacity of the environment against a growing population of elephants," he said. He said international ivory trade was an important source of revenue to support conservation and promotion of rural livelihood. He explained that Zambia and other SADC countries where elephant populations have already run beyond the CITES qualification for conditional international ivory trade pressed hard to amend the current trade ban in endangered animals. Other SADC countries that joined Zambia in negotiating for the sale of ivory are Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe. Zambia became a signatory to CITES in 1980.

Source: Xinhua

The CITES ivory quid pro quo...I.P.A. Manning

While it is good news that official ivory trading was banned at CITES COP 14 for nine years, to hear that the quid pro quo for this was to allow Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa to sell all their ivory registered before 31 January of this year, an amount unknown to CITES, is not good news; for it might, as was suggested at COP 14, be double the 70 tons which these countries had first applied to export. No one can control and regulate the ivory business in Japan and the flow of illegal ivory will join the legal. I predict that our hippo and elephant populations will, in some areas, now face eradication in the short term. From the field in Zambia, I can report a massive assault on our elephant and hippo; and elephant sport hunting of 20 bulls a year is allowed here, recently accounting for a 72 pounder, an animal of massive value to our tourist industry. Government intend increasing this number, as well as allowing the annual 150 or so animals shot on crop protection to be taken instead by sport hunters. All efforts to stop this have failed.

The only way we are going to see matters improve is if conservation and development money goes directly to villagers who share the elephant range. In some of these areas are trusts and associations which can care for the funds and see that it is not stolen. We need to support village schools, clinics and conservation agriculture as a start to encourage villagers to the view that destroying their wildlife resources will only make them poorer and more dependent on food aid. We need to make a direct connection between the conservation of elephant and hippo and development assistance. We need to prosecute the poachers. We need villagers to take responsibility for their land and natural resources.

Inquiries on conservation trusts, which are responsibly managed, may be addressed to gamefields@zamnet.zm

A Trojan Horse...

Happy Faces all around the Conference Center
The International Fund for Animal Welfare's Lynn Levine is on the ground at CITES in the Hague...she filed this story about the situation in committee with elephants yesterday...
June 14 - E-Day

At the end of the day yesterday, the African elephant range states met once again to try and hammer out an agreement. Later in the evening, a representative from Chad flew in and deliberations continued well into the night (some have heard up until the morning). From these meetings, a new proposal, jointly submitted by Chad and Zambia (!) incorporating a significant amount of the philosophy of the pro-conservation range states, emerged. The accord calls for a nine-year suspension of all trade in ivory. It also states that there will be no discussions on ivory trade until the nine-year period has ended. Another element that proponents of the original Kenya and Mali proposal were pushing for was cross-border cooperation among all range states plus an African Elephant Action Plan. The concession for gaining this suspension was the release of additional stockpiles from South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Botswana, but only ivory which was already part of the officially registered government stockpile by January 31, 2007. The quantities are somewhat unclear: several African delegates have stated that these additional stockpiles total around 70 tonnes, but the Secretariat announced in its press conference earlier today that it was more than double. Such a higher number than expecting could be worrying, but everyone is still feeling positive that 1) all four of these countries wanting to dump their stockpiles must pass CITES scrutiny before the clock starts ticking on the nine years, so the resting period could actually be much more than just the stated nine years and 2) this is a great day for both the elephants and the African countries that support conservation efforts on their behalf.

Everyone here is not surprisingly, exhausted. Still, we're off to celebrate!

Lynn